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COEfRIGHT DEPOSm 



THE ETHICS OF 
WILLIAM WOLLASTON 



BY 

CLIFFORD GRIFFETH THOMPSON 
M.A., B.D., D.D., Ph.D. 

PROFESSOR IN EMORY UNIVERSITY 

A dissertation presented to the Faculty of the Grondmite School 

of Yale University, in Camdidacy for the 

Degree of Doctor of Philosophy 




BOSTON 
RICHARD G. BADGER 

THE GORHAM PRESS 



COPTHIOHT, 1922, BY RlCHARD G. BaDOER 



All Rights Reserved 



^^'^°n 



Made in the United States of America 



^^ 



A^ 



The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A. 

AUG -7 1922 ^ 

©CI.A681279 



^ 



INTRODUCTION 

It has happened more than once in the history of thought 
that a really great and creative thinker has become the vic- 
tim of a traditional interpretation, which soon became so 
thoroughly established that no further thought was given 
to his system. Instead of giving his thought the critical 
examination which it really deserved, each generation of 
thinkers and writers would simply pigeonhole it according 
to the traditional interpretation. I am very sure that this 
is just what has happened in the case of Wollaston. Even 
British writers on the history of ethical philosophy have, 
for the most part, said the traditional things about him, 
and that without verification as to the truth of the state- 
ments made. This may be explained by the fact that his 
book soon became rather rare. Very few British writers 
give any evidence of having read Wollaston at all carefully 
and those who did read his book seem to have stopped with 
the first two sections. We can be quite sure from internal 
evidence that many of his critics knew him only through sec- 
ondary sources. Some attribute illustrations and even quo- 
tations to him that cannot be found in his work.^ Perhaps 
the most common of these fictitious illustrations is the one 
regarding a man breaking his wife's head, which is mentioned 
as authentic by even as great an authority on the Eighteenth 
Century as Leslie Stephen. "Thirty years' profound medi- 
tation had convinced Wollaston that the reason why a man 
should abstain from breaking his wife's head was, that it 
was a way of denying that she was his wife." -^ The same 
can be said of the French as of the British writers in this 
respect. Instead of criticising him on the basis of actual 
*L. Stephen, English Thought in the 18th Century, p. 130. 

3 



4 Introduction 

quotations and on the basis of Wollaston's own illustrations, 
they discuss him in a most general way, using illustrations 
that are not his. On the whole the German historians of 
philosophy understand him better and treat him more ex- 
tensively and more fairly. This, though, does not mean 
that they had read him more carefully, in fact one finds 
more of this fictitious material in the German works than in 
the British and French. It means that they had more sym- 
pathy with his rationalistic and idealistic pliilosophy and so 
they invented materials that more truly represented Wollas- 
ton. The Germans gave considerable attention to Wollaston 
because they regarded him as a precursor of Kant. So re- 
garding him, however, and making interpretations of his 
philosophy, without careful objective investigation, they 
naturally miss his meaning in many cases. They try to 
give Wollaston's ethics an intuitionistic interpretation for 
which there is no justification. Garve and Drechsler are 
responsible for this interpretation. The latter wrote a 
book dealing with Wollaston's philosophy exclusively; but 
perhaps the former was even more responsible for this 
interpretation becoming traditional, because he claims that 
his interpretation of Wollaston is an actual quotation and 
actually incloses his remarks in quotation marks. Later 
German writers have based their interpretation on this pas- 
sage. For example, Von Hartmann quotes the entire pas- 
sage and says that it is Christian Garve's translation of 
Wollaston.^ 

Conybeare tells us what a great impression Wollaston's 
intellectual criterion of morals made upon the contempor- 
aries of Wollaston who were interested in finding a firmer 
foundation for morals than that offered by hedonism. Cony- 
beare himself speaks of the theory as though it were a 
discovery in morals, "fit to be placed beside the discoveries 
of Newton in astronomy." ^ That his system enjoyed con- 
siderable popularity when it was first promulgated is proven 
by the fact that his work, itself, went through seven editions 

'Drechsler, tJber Will. Wollaston's Moralphilosophie, Erlangen, 1801. 
Garve, tJbersicht der vornehmsten Principien der Sittenlehre, p. 172. 
'Conybeare, Defence of Revealed Religion, p. 239. 



Introduction 5 

in ten years, and also by the number of books and pamphlets 
which it evoked. His popularity, however, must have been 
exceedingly ephemeral for his work soon became very rare. 
Because of the fantastic interpretations given to his system 
of ethics it was soon relegated to the curiosity section of the 
philosophical museum. 



CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction S 

WoUaston's Dedication 11 

The Relation of Wollaston to the Thought of His Age . . IS 

The Predecessors of Wollaston 18 

"The Religion of Nature Delineated" S2 

Exposition of the Section on the Nature of Goodness . 32 

Wollaston's Critical Interpretation of Other Systems . . 68 

Wollaston Deals with Possible Objections to His Principle 72 

General Interpretation of Section I 78 

I. Morality Treated as Analogous to Truth ... 78 

II. The Search for and Objective Standard of Moral- 
ity ... . 85 

Wollaston and His Critics 95 

I. That He Confuses Logical and Moral Relations . 95 

II. That Immorality as Well as Morality Conforms 

to Nature 114 

III. That Wollaston Obscures the Real Nature of 

Morality 125 

IV. That the Nature of Virtue is Not Defined but As- 

sumed 137 

V. That Wollaston's System is Over-Intellectualistic 150 

Critical Exposition of the Section on Happiness . . . 162 

I. Exposition of Section II "Of Happiness" . . 162 

7 



8 Contents 

PAQS 

II. An Examination of the Hedonistic Interpretation 

of Wollaston 171 

III. An Examination of the Utilitarian Interpretation 

of Wollaston 176 

IV. An Examination of the Dualistic Interpretation of 

Wollaston 184 

V. The Ethics of Wollaston Reconciles Rationalism 

and Hedonism 192 

Practical Religion and Practical Morality 198 

Section VI. "Truths Respecting Mankind in 

General" 198 

Section VII. "Truths Respecting Particular So- 
cieties of Men and of Governments" . . . 201 

Section VIII. "Truths Concerning Families and 

Relations" 201 

Section IX. "Truths Respecting a Private Man" 201 

The Metaphysical Teachings of Wollaston 204 

The Epistemology of Wollaston 208 

Section III. "Of Reasoning, and the Ways of 

Discovering Truth" . 208 

The Problem of Freedom 219 

Section IV. "Of the Obligations of Imperfect Be- 
ings with Respect to Their Power of Acting" 219 

The Problems of Evil and Immortality 230 

Section V. "Truths Relating to the Deity" . . 230 

Index 233 



THE ETHICS OF 
WILLIAM WOLLASTON 



THE ETHICS OF 
WILLIAM WOLLASTON 

WOLLASTON'S DEDICATION 

Wollaston dedicates his book, "The Religion of Nature 
Delineated," to his friend, one A. F., Esq., because it seems 
that this gentleman had asked him to state his thoughts 
upon three questions, namely; 

I. Is there any such thing as natural religion properly 
so called? 

II. If there is, what is it.^* 

III. How may a man qualify himself, so as to be able 
to judge for himself, of the other religions prof est in the 
world ; to settle his own opinions in disputable matters ; and 
then to enjoy tranquillity of mind, neither disturbing others, 
nor being disturbed at what passes among men? 

Wollaston's work, "The Religion of Nature Delineated," 
is an answer to the first two questions. We know that he 
gave considerable thought to the third, but none of his 
thoughts on that question were ever published. It would 
not be difficult to tell how he would answer it from the many 
suggestions in his answers to the other two questions. Natu- 
ral Religion, I am sure he would say, contains the great uni- 
versal and essentials of all religion and all else in the 
religions of the world is false. 

Wollaston says that if he had anticipated that he was 
to be called upon to write a book that he would have made 
notes on his readings and would have recorded his thoughts 

11 



12 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

through the years. Because he failed to do this he cannot, 
he says, write a learned book; "but can only give some of" 
his "thoughts upon the articles and duties of natural reli- 
gion." He makes almost no reference to modern moralists. 
His illustrations are taken largely from the classics. He 
claims originality for his ethical ideas. ^ 
* Wollaston, Religion of Nature Delineated, London, 1725. 



THE RELATION OF WOLLASTON TO THE 
THOUGHT OF HIS AGE 

In spite of the fact that WoUaston claims to be a phil- 
osopher after the order of Melchisedeck : "That which is 
advanced in the following papers, concerning the nature of 
moral good and evil, and is the prevailing thought that runs 
through them all, I never met with anywhere," I think that 
it can be shown that his philosophy belongs indubitably to 
the period in which he lived and that it is very definitely 
related to the stream of world thought. Wollaston died in 
1724, the year Kant was born, so his thought belongs to 
the first quarter of the 18th century. This period is gen- 
erally known as the early Enlightenment. It has been char- 
acterized as an age of reason. The breaking down of reli- 
gious authority necessitated the rationalization of morality. 
The practical difficulty which the moralists of the time 
faced was how to maintain order in society without the sanc- 
tions of traditional religion. Since theology refused to 
rationalize religion, the moralists had to seek other grounds 
on which to base morality. The old religion had taught that 
the revealed will of God determined the good, and as long 
as this religion of authority was generally accepted there 
was no room for ethical discussions. But with the rise of 
the rationalistic attitude toward religion, ethical specula- 
tion became necessary to the very salvation of morality.-'^ 

Wollaston calls his book "The Religion of Nature Deline- 
ated." He set out, as did the contemporary Deists, to prove 
the essentials of religion to be true apart from revelation. 
He would also, like them, limit the essential doctrines of 
religion to those which can be shown to be rational. The 
very questions he set out to answer definitely relate him 
to Deism. Reason for him, as for the deists, is the final 
> Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, p. XXXI. 

13 



14 The^ Ethics of William Wollaston 

test of truth in religion as elsewhere. Wollaston was in 
holy orders and perhaps belonged more to the Rationalistic 
School of Theology than to Deism, but there was much in 
common in the two movements. The rationalistic theology 
accepted the deistic position that faith must be tested by 
reason, that reason is the ultimate court of appeal. Essen- 
tial Christianity, it said, is reasonable and its truths are 
capable of rational proof. Deism made morality the essence 
of Natural Religion. The deists taught that he who believes 
God to exist must, in order to be true to reason, acknowledge 
the obligations of morality and natural religion. The the- 
ologians of the Rationalistic School, like the deists, laid 
more stress on right living than on subscriptions to theologi- 
cal creeds. Their religion was not only ethical, but like the 
deists they considered ethics to be the chief part of religion. 
Wollaston was in entire agreement with this view of religion. 
The first article of faith in Wollaston's religion is the belief 
that the human reason is competent to discover and to de- 
fine religious truth without supernatural aid or divine reve- 
lation. All religious truth is discernible by the unaided 
powers of reason and that which cannot be so explained is 
to be rejected.^ 

There were two schools of moralists in England in the 
18th century, — the Intellectual School and the Sensational 
School. These schools had a great deal in common. They 
had the same attitude towards traditional theology, espe- 
cially towards traditional theological ethics. Both schools 
were rationalistic in the theological sense and both made 
great use of the term "natural" as opposed to "inspira- 
tional" religion and ethics. The schools were entirely agreed 
that it is not the mere will of God which constitutes the 
distinction between right and wrong, and that morality is 
independent of revelation. Both schools used "conformity 
to nature" as the formula of morality, but the only thing 
in common in the use of it as the criterion of morality was 
the attempt to work out an ethics that would be independent 

»L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., chs. 2 and 3. Selby- 
Bigge, British Moralists, pp. XX-XXIV. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat., pp. 
7, 43 and 203, Hurst, His. of Rationalism. 



Relation of WoUaston to the Thought of His Age 15 

of traditional theological ethics. Both schools taught that 
virtue is natural.^ Selby-Bigge says that "according to na- 
ture" is an article of faith with both schools. This is true, 
but it is very evident that the two schools use "natural" 
and "according to nature" in very different senses. When 
the intellectualists say that virtue is natural they mean that 
it conforms to the eternal nature of things, and also that 
it considers the true nature of man and seeks to realize it. 
For the other school "natural" means in conformity to 
man's sentiments and affections. In the one school moral 
distinctions are matters of reason; in the other, a matter 
of feeling. Selby-Bigge says that the two schools are 
"primarily distinguished by their adoption of reason and 
feeling respectively as the faculty which perceives moral 
distinctions, a faculty declared in each case to be peculiar 
and not identifiable with ordinary reason or ordinary 
feeling." * 

I do not agree at all that Selby-Bigge's statement that I 
have just quoted is applicable to Wollaston. Some of the 
intellectualists did believe that the faculty which perceives 
moral distinctions is a "pecuhar" one "and not at all iden- 
tifiable with ordinary reason." These I would denominate 
intuitionists. Wollaston did not believe that man possesses 
a special moral faculty capable both of apprehending the 
reason why actions ought to be performed, i. e., the prin- 
ciple from which the rightness follows, and of causing the 
performance of such actions. I think that I can prove that 
Wollaston was not an intuitionist in ethics, nor an intu- 
itionalist in epistemology, but that his philosophy is a re- 
conciliation of the empirical and rational elements both in 
knowledge and in morals. We have considered pre-Kantian 
rationalism identical with intuitionalism, and in general this 
is true, for it is a philosophy which makes knowledge and 
morals dependent upon a body of immediately given self- 
evident and necessary first truths. Kant's epistemology 
reconciled the a priori and the a posteriori factors in knowl- 
edge. Thanks to the natural empiricism of the English 

3 L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., ch. 9. 
* Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, Intro. 



16 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

mind and to the influence of Locke, Wollaston did not re- 
quire a Hume to arouse him from dogmatic slumber. Wol- 
laston went much further than Kant, for the latter remained 
an intuitionist in morals, a position inconsistent with his 
anti-intuitionalistic epistemological position, while the for- 
mer tried to reconcile the a priori and the a posteriori fac- 
tors in morals. 

The term rationalism is used in three very different 
senses. When theologians use the term they generally have 
in mind the religious and ethical systems which base truth 
on the reason rather than on revelation. Wollaston was a 
rationalist in this sense of the word. A second use of the 
term would identify rationalism with intuitionism and intu- 
itionalism. The term, when given this connotation, cannot 
apply to Wollaston, but moralists of the Sensational School 
quite generally confuse rationalism and intuitionalism and 
consequently criticize Wollaston for believing in innate ideas 
of morality. The third view thinks of reason as a factor in 
knowledge but that it is dependent upon experience for its 
data. Wollaston was a rationalist in this sense, for he be- 
lieves that knowledge is dependent upon the senses for data 
and upon the reason for organization. Dewey classifies the 
uses of the term in these ways and then says : "The three 
senses are historically connected. The 18th century ra- 
tionalism in theology and in morals is derived from the in- 
sistence of Descartes upon method, and clearness and dis- 
tinctness as criteria of truth. It is combined, however, with 
an empiricism which descends from Locke." ^ It is cer- 
tainly true that Wollaston combined the truth of rational- 
ism with that of empiricism. His higher rationalism, un- 
like intuitionalism, is not opposed to experience, but instead 
is based on experience. It was a construction of experience 
itself as a system of reason.^ I have no particular objection 
to classing Wollaston with the "Philosophical Intuitionists" 
as Sidgwick does, because his definition "Philosophical In- 
tuitionism" is a clear statement of the a priori factor in the 
determination of duty. Sidgwick says: "it is a view that 

"Dewey, Art., Rationalism in Balwin Diet. 
"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. D., pp. 42-6. 



Relation of Wollaston to the Thought of His Age 17 

seeks a complete synthesis of practical rules, and the prac- 
tical is held to be able to lay down one universal rule capable 
of distinguishing good from evil." '^ This "one universal 
rule," in Wollaston's ethics, is that everything should be 
treated as that which it is. This is a universal and necessary 
truth, but Wollaston does not think of it as an innate idea 
or an intuition, but as a product of reflection. 

I think that it can be said with truth that Wollaston 
gave to the formula "according to nature" a more meta- 
physical connotation than was generally given to it, and 
that when he spoke of the "law of nature" he meant some- 
thing quite different from the ordinary meaning. Locke 
used "natural" in a somewhat similar way when he said that 
morality is capable of being demonstrated as "natural." 
This meaning is that morality is as natural and as necessary 
as a natural law. In no other sense could the law of nature 
be the law of morality. The naturalness and necessity of 
natural law is not what is meant by the naturalness and 
necessity of morality. In a sense, though, it is the natural 
law in the moral world and is based on the belief that the 
world is all of a piece. The utilitarian interest was great in 
Wollaston, due to the fact that he consciously tried to recon- 
cile the opposing views of "naturalness," by showing that 
ultimately the two belong to the same all-comprehending 
world of meaning. He may be fairly accused of confusing 
the two meanings of "law of nature," but he was seeking to 
make it clear that morality is based on the real nature and 
relations of things, and that happiness has the same foun- 
dation. The free conformity of life to the nature of things 
is goodness, and happiness is the natural and necessary 
consequence of such a life.^ 

' Sidgwick, Method of Ethics, ch. Intuitionism, I, 6, 8 and 13. 
* Locke, Essay on the Human Understanding, p. 28. Wollaston, Reli. 
of Nat. D., pp. 37-8 and 41-2. 



THE PREDECESSORS OF WOLLASTON 

Professor Sidgwick is right when he says that: "The 
main stream of English ethics, so far as it flows independ- 
ently of Revelational Theology, begins with Hobbes and 
the replies that Hobbes provoked." He says that the start- 
ing point of Hobbes' ethical speculation is to be sought 
mainly in the current view of the law of nature which was 
defined to mean the rules that men ought to observe, so far 
as they can be known by the light of nature apart from 
revelation. ^ Grotius had taken the position that this 
natural law is a part of divine law which follows necessarily 
from the essential nature of man, and is as unalterable as 
the truths of mathematics. This law of nature, Grotius 
says, is cognizable a priori by an abstract consideration of 
human nature.^ Hobbes took the position that Grotius 
had left unanswered the all-important question: "What 
is man's ultimate reason for obeying these laws of nature .^^'^ 
He undertook to answer it by sa3dng that each man's appe- 
tites and desires are naturally directed either "to the pres- 
ervation of his life or to the heightening of it in the way 
of pleasure. Since all the voluntary actions of men tend to 
their own preservation or pleasure, it cannot be reasonable to 
aim at anything else; in fact, nature rather than reason 
fixes the end of human action, to which it is reason's func- 
tion to show the means. Hence if we ask why it is reasonable 
for any individual to observe the rules of social behavior 
that are commonly called moral, the answer is obvious that 
this is only indirectly reasonable, as a means to his own 
preservation or pleasure." ^ Naturally there was a very 

* Sidgwick, His. of Ethics, p. 159. 
' Ibid., 161. 
« Ibid., p. 165. 

18 



The Predecessors of Wollaston 19 

strong reaction from this extreme hedonistic position and 
Wollaston belongs to this reaction movement. This school 
of thinkers were insistent upon the point that morality must 
of necessity be based on the real nature of things, and must, 
consequently, be as natural and as necessary as the natures 
and relations of things. So Wollaston was influenced nega- 
tively by Hobbes. He reacted, not only from the ethical 
position of Hobbes, but, perhaps, even more from the 
materialistic determinism of his philosophy.* 

I think that it can be said that Wollaston was influ- 
enced on the positive side by several very different schools 
of thought. Rogers is right when he says that Wollaston 
was greatly influenced in his thinking by Locke's episte- 
mology. He, like Locke, denied innate ideas, in general, 
and innate ideas of morality in particular.^ Wollaston, 
like the entire rationalistic school of British moralists, was 
also greatly influenced by the Newtonian conception of the 
universe; but, perhaps, even more by the mathematical 
method of the new science. The rationalistic philosophy 
of Descartes was also influential in the same way. In fact, 
what Leslie Stephen says of the intellectualists, in general, 
is true of Wollaston in particular. He says : "It is very 
diflicult to tell whether the intellectualists in morals were 
more influenced by the Newtonian conception of the universe, 
which gave the world loftier ideas of God, and great aid and 
support to morality and religion ; or by Descartes' philoso- 
phy, which inspired the rationalistic method of ethics.'^ ^ By 
the use of the mathematical method, inspired by both New- 
ton and Descartes, the intellectualists claimed that they 
were able to prove the existence of God and the obligations 
of Natural Religion. Wollaston certainly cannot be classi- 
fied as a rationalist in the Cartesian sense of the term, nor 
would any one think of classifying him as an empiricist. To 
my mind he is far more of an empiricist than a rationalist, 
if rationalism is given the intuitional connotation. Rogers 
is perhaps right when he says that Wollaston's position was 

* WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 69 and 104-5. 

" Rogers, His. of Ethics, p. 150. 

*■ L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., p. XXXII. 



20 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

a combination of the two.*^ It has been customary to call 
Wollaston an Intuitionist, meaning thereby that he taught 
that men have innate ideas of virtue and vice. I do not 
understand him to teach any such doctrine. Rather, I 
understand him to say that all of our knowledge comes 
through the senses. Wollaston thinks, also, as I shall try 
to show later, that we have rational synthetic minds that 
are capable of organizing experience and of determining 
what our duty is in any given situation of life. He believed 
that there are two elements, both in knowledge and in 
morality, the empirical and the rational. While Wollaston 
was influenced, on the rationalistic side, by both Descartes 
and Newton, he was not by any means a disciple of either, 
and the influence of each upon his thinking was very general. 
He did get his rationalistic attitude and method partly from 
them. I say this advisedly, because this rationahstic attitude 
was characteristic of the age. The rationalistic method, 
however, was taken bodily from them and used by Wollaston, 
as off^ering an analogy of morality, to determine the general 
formula of morality.® 

The influence of Cudworth upon Wollaston was more 
specific. I think that it was his insistence upon the objec- 
tive reality of moral distinctions, and his insistence that 
the criterion of morality must be rational in nature, that 
most impressed Wollaston. Cudworth wrote his Treatise 
concerning eternal and immutable morality in answer to 
Hobbes. In this work he took the position that just as 
knowledge contains a permanent intelligible element over and 
above the flux of sense impression, so there exist eternal and 
immutable ideas of morality. According to Cudworth the 
distinctions of good and evil have an objective reality, "cog- 
nizable by reason, no less than the relations of space and 
number; the knowledge of them no doubt comes to the hu- 
man mind from the divine; but it is from the divine reason, 
in whose light man imperfectly participates, not merely from 
the divine will as such." Things are what they are, not by 

' Rogers, His. of Ethics, p. 141. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. D., pp. 24, 
48-50. 

• Ibid., Sec. III. 



The Predecessors of WoUaston 21 

will but by nature. . . , For though the will and power 
of God have an absolute, infinite and unlimited command 
upon the existence of all created things to make them to be, 
or not to be at pleasure; yet when things exist, they are 
what they are. . . . Nothing is morally good or evil by mere 
will without nature, because everything is what it is by na- 
ture, and not by will. . . . No positive commands what- 
soever do make anything morally good or evil, which nature 
had not made such before.^ Wollaston agrees with Cud- 
worth that the real nature of things constitutes the basis 
of morality. This is what is meant by saying that their 
ethics is objective. This objective nature is discerned by 
the reason, and the appropriate moral behavior is deter^ 
mined by the reason also. 

But Wollaston was as greatly influenced by the empiri- 
cists. Cudworth and Wollaston have very different ideas 
as to the relation of sense and reason in knowledge, thanks 
to the influence of Locke upon Wollaston; but both base 
the criterion of morality on the reason. Cudworth says 
that the mind has conceptions which, while occasioned by 
sense, could not be formed but by a faculty superior to 
sense. He does not, like Locke, believe that all knowledge 
comes through the senses, but rather holds to the doctrine 
of innate ideas. This doctrine of innate ideas was attacked 
by Locke, and Clarke and Wollaston admit the force of 
Locke's arguments. They were, nevertheless, greatly in- 
fluenced by Cudworth. ^^ They were especially influenced 
by his statement that moral relations are as evident and as 
necessary as the laws of thought and the axioms of mathe- 
matics. Speaking of eternal truths, Cudworth says, "Neither 
are there such eternal truths as these only in mathematics 
and concerning quantity, but also in ethics concerning 
morality." ^^ Cudworth says that ethical ideas do not 
come from experience, but are necessary ideas in the divine 
and in the human reason. The individual mind, being derived 

"Cudworth, Treatise Concerning Eternal and Immutable Morality, 
bk. I, ch. 2. 

" Clarke, Natural Religion, p. 45. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 45. 
"Cudworth, Intel. System, p. 734. 



22 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

from the eternal mind, inherits these eternal moral truths, 
is conscious of them, and realizes their obligation. ^^ This 
extreme Intuitionalism is, of course, unnecessary, and the 
universality and necessity of morality is entirely reconcil- 
able with an ethical epistemology which gives due place to 
the empirical factor in knowledge. Ethical ideas, Cudworth 
says, cannot come from experience, for experience is always 
particular, and morality must be universal and necessary. 
He is right, of course, in saying that experience cannot give 
universality and necessity ; but, as Clarke and Wollaston 
realized, his inference from this to the doctrine of innate 
ideas of morality is not necessary. And yet they realized 
that he was right in insisting that the distinction between 
right and wrong is a rational distinction and is universal 
and necessary. Clarke and Wollaston agree that it would 
be contradictory to say that any power, human or divine, 
could change their nature.^^ The good could not be bad 
nor the bad good.^* This internal perception of moral 
truth, which Cudworth calls conscience, teaches men that 
the good of the whole is better than individual good alone. 
Thus he set for Wollaston a eudaemonistic example.-^^ 

Cumberland's importance, for our purpose, rests on his 
attempt to supply the connecting link between moral per- 
ception and moral action by identifying the good of all with 
the good of each, and on his endeavor to make the utilitarian 
principle of the good of all the ethical end and the standard 
of moral action. The good of all is the moral standard, and 
the reason is the moral faculty. He believes in the mathe- 
matical certainty of moral truth, and his faith in the ulti- 
mate rationality of the world is so great that he believes 
that this will result in the good of humanity. He did not, 
like Wollaston, say that one should consider the probable 
consequences of actions and that these should enter into 
the motivation. Cumberland took the position that the 
Baconian method is as applicable to ethics as to natural 
science. By observing external nature we discover its truths 

"Cudworth, Intel. System, p. 730. 

" Qarke, Nat. Rdi., p. 45. WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7- 

" Cudworth, Intel. System., p. 895. 

" Ibid., p. 898. 



The Predecessors of WoUaston 23 

and laws, and by studying the nature of man we discover 
the relation in which he stands to the natural universe of 
which he forms a part. The foundation of morality lies 
in the nature of things, antecedent to all positive law, else 
no reason could be given for the enactment of any law. He 
defines the laws of nature as "immutably true propositions 
regulative of voluntary actions as to choice of good and 
avoidance of evil, and which carry with them an obligation 
to outward acts of obedience." ^^ The laws of nature are 
the laws of God, so are the universal laws of right reason. 
There are, he says, no innate ideas, but by means of reason 
man perceives the mathematical and moral truths contained 
in nature, and both are of equal certainty. ^"^ Practical 
reason points out the ends to be pursued and the means to 
those ends, and since reason is common to man, all unpreju- 
diced men agree with regard to the fundamental principles 
of morality. The mind of man naturally assents to the uni- 
versal law of nature. He states this law as the universal 
law of benevolence: "The greatest possible benevolence of 
every rational agent towards all the rest, constitutes the 
happiest state of each and all, so far as depends on their 
own power, and is necessarily required for their happiness, 
therefore the common good is the supreme law." ^^ The hap- 
piness of all is at the same time the end of every rational 
man's actions and the standard of right and wrong.^® Cum- 
berland's dynamic is prudential hedonism. The law of 
benevolence is the law both of rationality and of reality, he 
says ; but then he proceeds to say that it derives its obliga- 
tion from the fact that only by striving to promote the hap- 
piness of all can one be happy. Sidgwick says that Cum- 
berland is the first one to lay down the principle that "the 
common good of all is the supreme end and the standard of 
morality." So far, says Sidgwick, he may be fairly called 
the precursor of the later utilitarianism. Sidgwick says that 
Cumberland meant by "the common good of all" not only 
"the greatest happiness of all but perfection." He regards 

" Cumberland, De legibus naurae Cap. V. 5. 

" Ibid., Cap. V, 8. 

"Cumberland, Proleg. IX.; Cap. I, 15 and Cap. Ill, 3. 

" Ibid., Cap. I, 4 and 22. 



24 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

Cumberland as a precursor of Wollaston, since, in his esti- 
mation, Wollaston'^ position was that of late utilitar- 

20 

lanism/" 

The connection of Locke with the moral systems of Clarke 
and Wollaston is well expressed by Erdmann: "In the first 
book of his Essay, Locke had placed speculative and practi- 
cal principles on the same plane. In regard to the former, 
however, he had supplemented the negative result that they 
are not innate, by the positive statement that they are pre- 
sented to us by the external world. Exactly the same pro- 
cess must be looked for in the case of the latter: the mind 
cannot draw the principles of action from within itself ; they 
must come to it from without, and not, as mediaeval philoso- 
phy had taught, through revelation, but from the external 
world. This positive addition to Locke's negative asser- 
tion was made by some thinkers who are connected with him, 
not merely by nationality, but also by the fact that they 
owe to him their first impulse towards philosophy." Erd- 
mann, then, expressly mentions Clarke and Wollaston. ^^ 

Wundt also connects Locke directly with the objective 
intellectualists. Locke, he says, even draws a comparison 
between the application of moral rules to particular cases 
and the application of mathematical axioms. Such state- 
ments clearly bear the closest relation to his opinion that 
"all judgments on moral values are the results of rational 
insight and intellectual deliberation." ^^ This opinion con- 
nects Locke with the Cambridge Intellectualists, says 
Wundt, but they are, he says, distinguished from Locke by 
the fact that his morality was subjective whereas their cri- 
terion was objective. "Their attempt is rather to show the 
objective reality of the moral law, from which its obligatory 
force necessarily follows." Whereas the subjective intel- 
lectualists, as Wundt terms them, make the natural law to 
be a thing of empirical origin in our sensations of pleasure 
and pain, the objective intellectualists, Clarke and Wollas- 
ton, have moral norms that are claimed to possess an ob~ 

2« Sidgwick, His. of Ethics, p. 174. 

21 Erdmann, His. of Phil., vol. II, p. 116. 

23 Wundt, Ethics, p. 323. 



The Predecessors of WoUaston 25 

jective reality equal to that of mathematical or physical 
laws. A transgression of law in the moral realm is like a 
change which disobeys the laws of physical nature. 

For Locke, as for the objective moralists, Clarke and 
Wollaston, morality is essentially a matter of conformity 
to relations. For Locke there are three fundamental cer- 
tainties ; the existence of the self, of God and of the world, 
and there are three corresponding fundamental ethical con- 
ceptions ; man, God and nature. The foundation of morality 
does not lie in the nature of man alone, but in the nature and 
character of God, the creator of the universe. God cannot 
act contrary to his own nature, and so the laws of the uni- 
verse are as unchangeable as God himself; for the laws of 
nature are the laws of the divine nature, the will and the 
command of God. Thus the law of nature is eternal and 
unchangeable, the rule of God to himself and to all his 
creatures. Into this divine order man is bom, a sociable 
being endowed with reason. By means of reason, which is 
the only ethical faculty, man perceives and recognizes the 
law of nature, which is at the same time the law of God. 
There are moral relations, which are capable of being ration- 
ally perceived antecedent to all positive revelation. In the 
law of nature reason discovers the foundation of duties and 
rights. The various kinds of duties are founded on various 
relations ; — the duty of piety, on the relation of man to God ; 
the duties of benevolence, equity and love arise from the 
various relations men stand to one another.^^ 

Clarke, of course, stands a great deal closer to Wollaston, 
both in time and in thought, than did any of his other pre- 
decessors. Wollaston was, in fact, an older contemporary 
of Clarke, but his book was not published until two years 
before his death, 1722, while Clarke's work on the same sub- 
ject was published in 1706. Clarke's philosophy represents 
a reaction both from the materialistic determinism of Hobbes 
and from the spiritualistic determinism of Calvin. He sought 
to define right and wrong so clearly and to place the dis- 
tinction between them on such a solid foundation that moral 
relations would be as indubitable as are mathematical rela- 
^ Locke, Essay on the Human Understanding, Bk. IV, ch. 2. 



26 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

tions. This he did by making reason and morality conform. 
He insisted, however, upon making an important distinction, 
a distinction equally important in Wollaston's system : "The 
only difference is, that assent to a plain speculative truth 
is not in a man's power to withhold, but to act according to 
the plain right and reason of things, this he may, by the 
natural liberty of his will, forbear." ^^ Wollaston's ethics, 
also, attempts to ground morality on the very nature of 
things, and to show moral relations to be necessary and in- 
dubitable. He, also, says that assent to truth is necessary, 
but acts conformable to truth are contingent upon free 
choice. This objectivity of the moral standard, and this 
insistence upon freedom make both Clarke and Wollaston 
stand out distinctly. ^'^ Erdmann says that: "These two 
had placed the determining factor in the object, but had 
left it to the choice of the subject whether or not to fol- 
low it." 2« 

Clarke undertakes to state a complete moral principle in 
terms of "fitness" of actions to the objective nature of 
things. He says that things stand one to another in cer- 
tain relations which are necessary and eternal; and that we 
can conceive nothing without, at the same time, conceiving 
its relations to other things. There are such relations be- 
tween man and God and between man and man, and from 
such relations there arises a "fitness" or "unfitness" of ac- 
tions. The whole of these relations constitutes truth. 
"These eternal diff'erent relations of things constitute or 
at least involve eternal fitness or unfitness in the application 
of things one to another; with regard to which the will of 
God always . . . chooses . . ., and which ought likewise 
to determine the wills of all subordinate rational beings. 
These eternal and necessary differences of things make it fit 
and reasonable for these creatures so to act; they cause it 
to be their duty and lay an obligation on them to act in ac- 

^ Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, vol. II, p. 14. 

" "Hatten diesen beiden zwar den determinirenden Grund in die Ob- 
jecte gesetz, dagegen es dem Belieben des Subjectes anheimgestellt, ob 
es ihmfolgen wolle." 

^Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 107. 



The Predecessors of Wollaston 27 

cordance with the eternal fitness of things." ^'^ To deny that 
I should do for another man what he in like case should do 
for me, "and to deny it, either in word or action is as if a 
man should contend that, though two and three are equal 
to five, yet five is not equal to two and three." ^^ "Wicked- 
ness," according to Clarke, "is the same absurdity and in- 
solence in morals, as it would be in natural things to pretend 
to alter the relations of numbers, or to change the prop- 
erties of geometrical figures." ^^ 

Lowman, one of Clarke's followers, says, that Clarke con- 
ceived of morality as "the practice of reason." ^^ Morality 
for Clarke, says Falckenberg, is the subjective conformity 
to the objective "fitness of things." The good is the fitting. 
Certain things, relations, and modes of action are suited 
to one another and others not. "He who is induced by 
passion to act contrary to the eternal relations or harmony 
of things, contradicts his own reason in thus undertaking 
to disturb the order of the universe; he commits the ab- 
surdity of willing that things should be that which they 
are not. Injustice is in practice that which falsity and con- 
tradiction are in theoretical affairs." ^* 

The positions of Clarke and Wollaston are so very similar 
on most questions that it has been common to practically 
identify them. I do not deny the justification of that pro- 
cedure. I do wish, however, to call attention to the fact 
that Wollaston does not acknowledge indebtedness to Clarke. 
Rather, he insists that his treatment is original: "That, 
which is advanced in the following papers, concerning the 
nature of moral good and evil, and is the prevailing thought 
that runs through them all, I never met with anywhere." ^^ 
Only once in his entire book does he use the terminology of 
Clarke, and even in that instance the use may well be acci- 
dental. The word used by Wollaston is, however, Clarke's 

^' Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, vol. II, pp. 3-7. 

^* Ibid., 619. 

" Clarke, Evidences, p. 42. 

^Lowman, Unity and Perfection of God, p. 29. 

« Falckenberg, His. of Phil., pp. 196-7. 

=» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 6. 



28 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

favorite term, namely, "fit." We can say that there is no 
verbal dependence, for even in the case just mentioned 
Clarke never uses "fit" but "fitness" or "fiting." The 
thoughts of the two men, though, with reference to the cri- 
terion of morality are so very similar that it is quite im- 
possible for me to doubt the dependence of the one on the 
other. On two rather important questions of the time the 
men differed considerable, namely, the question of the rela- 
tion of happiness to virtue and the question of the relation 
of truth and revelation. 

Perhaps there is more difference between Clarke and 
Wollaston on the question of happiness than on any other, 
and this difference is, I suppose, responsible for the fact 
that Wollaston has often been classed with the hedonists, 
while Clarke has never been so classed. Clarke says that 
happiness is a necessary consequent of acting according to 
the fitness of things. "God," he says, "will certainly cause 
truth and right to terminate in happinss." ^^ He says 
that virtue "tends to the good of the world" as certainly as 
physical effects or mathematical truth follow from its prin- 
ciples.^^ It may be said, in general, that Clarke considers 
happiness more as the necessary consequent of true living, 
and that the desire to be happy and make others happy 
does not enter into the motivation of moral actions to the 
same extent with him as with Wollaston. It is true that 
Wollaston does insist that happiness is the natural and 
necessary consequence of right living; but he also empha- 
sizes the fact that one should deliberately consider the 
happiness or unhappiness that can be expected to result 
from a given action, and that without so doing one cannot 
be said to be acting truly. It is, Wollaston thinks, wrong 
not to treat happiness as what it is, a true mental state 
and a desirable human good.^^ 

Vorlander says that while Clarke takes the objective 
ethical principle of the fitness of actions only from the uni- 
versal metaphysical side, Wollaston tries to define it more 

" Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, 512. 

"Ibid., 524. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 38. 



The Predecessors of Wollaston 29 

definitely, partly by means of reference to the particular 
purposes of tilings, partly "through more definite reference 
to the principle of happiness." ^^ Wollaston does make a 
significant advance from the position taken by Clarke in that 
he gave far more consideration to consequences, in so far 
as they can be anticipated, and human happiness is the most 
important of all the consequences that must be considered. 
I would go so far as to say that such a consideration must 
constitute an all important part of every moral action, and 
that due place must be given to the consideration of conse- 
quences by any system of ethics that makes any pretence 
of being based on an objective foundation. The principle, 
otherwise, is that of Intuitionism. Clarke does say that God 
created the world only that he might communicate to his 
creatures goodness and happiness, and that he expects and 
requires that all his creatures should endeavor to promote 
happiness among men.*^ There is another passage which 
better represents Clarke's position and shows him to be more 
eudsemonistic than do these passages. I refer to the pas- 
sage with which he begins his great work on Natural Religion, 
a passage which states the thesis of his work and gives, in 
one sentence, his metaphysics, philosophy of religion, and 
philosophy of morals : "The same necessary and eternal 
different relations, that different things bear one to another, 
and the same consequent fitness or unfitness of the applica- 
tion of different relations one to another, with regard to 
which the will of God always and necessarily does determine 
itself, to choose to act only what is agreeable to justice, 
equity, goodness and truth, in order to the welfare of the 
whole universe, ought likewise constantly to determine the 
wills of all subordinate rational beings, to govern all their 
actions by the same rule, for the good of the public." ^^ 
For Clarke, then, consequences, in so far as they can be 
anticipated, must necessarily enter into every motivation; 
and are involved in acting "according to the fitness of 

^' "durch die bestimmtere Beziehung auf das Princip der Gliickselig- 
keit." Vorlander, Gesch. der Philosophischen Moral, etc., p. 386. 
" Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, 524. 
" Clarke, Nat. Reli., I, Intro. 



30 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

things." It is true, however, that Clarke does think of 
happiness more as the necessary consequence of acting ac- 
cording to moral principles and less as an element in the 
motivation. He leaves happiness to providence and has the 
faith to believe that it will result from treating everything 
according to nature. 

The article in Chambers' Encyclopedia says that Wollas- 
ton's system is a development of Clarke's system. This is 
undoubtedly true in the sense that Wollaston went further 
away from ecclesiastical ethics. As the article w^ell says 
"his methods were exclusively rational," whereas Clarke de- 
pended more on religious authority and religious sanctions.*^ 
Both Clarke and Wollaston take as their starting point 
"the clearness, immutability and universality of the law of 
nature." ^^ They agree that morality is founded upon "the 
eternal and necessary differences of things," and that the 
essentials of morality rest upon as sure a foundation as the 
laws of thought in logic or the axioms in mathematics.** 
An interesting question arose as to the relation of revela- 
tion to such a view of ethics. It was seen very clearly that 
an inspired system of ethics is no more necessary than an 
inspired system of mathematics. Clarke, however, did not 
regard revelation as superfluous as did Wollaston. He took 
the position that while revelation is not necessary to reveal 
a code of morality it is necessary to reveal the sanctions of 
that code. He thinks with Wollaston that the reason is a 
sufficient guide to morals, that revelation is not necessary 
to tell men how they ought to live. He thinks that revela- 
tion is necessary, however, to tell men that a true life leads 
to everlasting happiness and that a wicked life leads to 
everlasting misery. Clarke thinks that most men will be 
too weak to live right without a belief in the hereafter. So 
while Clarke is as sincerely anxious to prove that moral 
principles are binding, independent of Divine appointment, 
as is Wollaston, he is no less concerned that morality re- 
quires the support of revealed religion. So while he be- 

" Art. Wollaston, Chambers Ency., vol. 10, p. 709. 

*3L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. I, p. 123. 

** Clarke, Works, pp. 609-13. Wollaston, Rell. of Nat. D., p. 24. 



The Predecessors of WoUaston 31 

lieves that "virtue is worthy to be chosen for its own sake" 
and also that the virtuous life necessarily leads to happi- 
ness, he still thinks revelation to be necessary "for the 
refonnation of mankind." He says that revelation is needed 
as a bulwark of truth, particularly concerning the here- 
after, "for without revelation many men could not forbear 
doubting a future state of retribution or reward, in spite 
of the strongest arguments of reasons." ^^ Wollaston makes 
only one reference to revelation and that is in connection 
with his treatment of the problem of evil. He had said that 
"there must be a future life where proper amends may be 
made," where the wrongs of this world may be made right. 
If this life be all, he argued, "the general and usual state 
of mankind is scarce consistent with the idea of a reason- 
able cause." ^^ But how can we be sure that God will reward 
virtue in the next world more liberally than in this? In 
trying to answer this question, he says, he "begins to be 
very sensible how much he wants a guide." ^^ He does not, 
however, grant that we have a guide other than reason, for, 
in his view, the Scriptures constitute only that kind of 
guide.^^ The only solution of the problem of evil, thinks 
Wollaston, and revelation can offer no other, is belief in 
the ultimate rationality of the universe.*® So we can say 
with the Grande Dictionnaire Universel that "Wollaston 
made morality to rest upon a foundation entirely indepen- 
dent of revelation." ^^ 

« Clarke, Works, pp. 643, 646, 652 and 667. 

« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 205. 

« Ibid., p. 211. 

« Ibid., Sec. IX, Prop. xii. 

" Ibid., pp. 72 and 113-14. 

"Grande Diet. Universel, Art. Wollaston. 



THE RELIGION OF NATURE DELINEATED 

Section I 

"of moral good and EVIIi" 

This thesis is an endeavor to give a systematic and criti- 
cal exposition of the Ethics of William Wollaston, but since 
he was the author of only one work on that subject, "The 
Religion of Nature Delineated," this treatment naturally 
takes the form of a critical commentary on that book. I 
have tried to harmonize his order of treatment with a strictly 
logical and systematic procedure. Since my purpose is to 
delineate his Ethics, and to treat other aspects of his gen- 
eral discussion from that point of view, I have in several in- 
stances departed from his order of treatment. 

Introduction 

the relation of morality and natural religion 

"The foundation of religion," says Wollaston, "lies in 
that difference between the acts of men, which distinguishes 
them into good, evil, indifferent. For if there is such a 
difference, there must be religion; and contra." Erdmann 
understands him to mean by this that all religion is based 
on the difference which men must make between good and 
bad, and where such difference is made you have religion. 
He understands that: "Nothing else is here meant by reli- 
gion but the obligation to do what may not be omitted and 
to refrain from doing what may not be done (So wird hier 
unter Religion nicht Andres verstanden, als die Verpflichtung, 
zu thun was nicht unterlossen). . . . To obey the law which 
God has given is religion in general, and to obey that law 
in particular which he reveals unto us when we rightly em- 

32 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 33 

ploy our natural abilities is the religion of nature or natural 
religion." ^ So Wollaston begins his work by seeking to find 
the ultimate ground of natural religion. He grounds Nat- 
ural Religion in the distincton that men naturally must make 
between good and evil. It is the necessity of thinking that 
constitutes the necessity and the universality of this dis- 
tinction. 

Just as Natural Religion is based on natural morality, 
so is morality grounded in the nature of things. Moralists, 
Wollaston says, have long sought for some idea or principle 
that would decide the morality of adts, but have not come 
to any agreement. He proposes a principle that he considers 
self-evident, and implies that this is the principle which has 
really determined men's evaluations of conduct. Wollaston 
proposes the plain and obvious principle of evaluation, used 
by the plain man, as the moral criterion. He says just let 
things "speak for themselves," and they will "proclaim their 
own rectitude or obliquity." ^ He means by this that the 
nature and relations of things determine their moral char- 
acter. Selby-Bigge says that the British moralists of all 
schools base morality on the nature of things, and all make 
their appeal to the ordinary man's ideas of virtue rather 
than to those of saints and philosophers.^ 



In this paragraph Wollaston discusses the necessary im- 
plications of morality, intelligence and freedom. "That 
act, which may be denominated morally good or evil, must 
be the act of a being capable of distinguishing, choosing and 
acting for himself; or more briefly, of an intelligent and 
free agent." Blakey suggests that Wollaston was influ- 
enced by William King's book, "Treatise on the Origin of 
Evil," as well as by Clarke, in arriving at his conception 
of the freedom of the will and of its importance for moral- 
ity.* But Erdmann is right in saying that the starting 

^Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 113. 
"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
3 Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, p. XVII. 
* Blakey, His. of Morals, p. 208. 



34 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

point in Wollaston's thinking is with the ideas of good and 
evil as necessary ideas because of the very nature of things. 
Then he arrives at the notion of freedom as the necessary 
implication of good and evil. In this division Wollaston lays 
down the preconditions of morality, — intelligence and free- 
dom.^ Properly speaking, he says, "no act at all can be 
ascribed to that being which is not indued with these ca- 
pacities," and certainly no moral character can be applied 
to acts other than those of a "being capable of distinguish- 
ing, choosing and acting for himself." ^ All other kinds 
of acts are but the acts of an instrument, acts "under a 
necessity incumbent ab extra" and consequently not moral 
acts at all.^ 

Wollaston's only proof of freedom, in this section of his 
work, is that it is the necessary precondition of morality. If 
he had been asked, but why must there be morality.? I sup- 
pose that he would have answered very much as did Kant, 
later "I know that I ought." But while Kant attributed 
the feeling of ought to an intuition, to an indubitable and 
immediate impingement of the moral conscience speaking 
within ; Wollaston could say, only, that intelligence demands 
that we treat things according to their natures, that we act 
conformably with reason. The one constitutes a moral im- 
perative as much as does the other. So while Kant's ought 
is subjective, resting as it does on intuition, and Wollaston's 
ought is objective, being based on experience and ratio- 
cination ; still "If we ought we can" holds as much for Wol- 
laston as for Kant. Wollaston does not say that we have 
an immediate consciousness of freedom nor an immediate 
consciousness of ought, but both are for him the product 
of thinking about the natures of things and of our rela- 
tions there-to. As intelligent beings we cannot do otherwise 
than perceive the natures of things and our relations to the 
rest of reality. In view of these natures and relations we see 
that there are duties we ought to perform or else be false 
to ourselves and to the universe. So if we ought we can, 

^Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 114. 
• Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
' Ibid., p. 8. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 36 

and since we know that we ought we know that we can, for 
freedom is the necessary precondition of there being an 
ought. 

II 

This paragraph is concerned with defining the nature of 
truth. "Those propositions are true, which express things 
as they are; or, truth is the conformity of those words or 
signs, by which things are exprest, to the things them- 
selves." ® Here WoUaston is asserting what he understands 
by truth. It is, he says, the conformity of thought and 
language to reality. 

Ill 

The topic of this paragraph is the nature of goodness. 
"A true proposition may be denied, or things may be denied 
to be what they are, by deeds, as well as by express words or 
another proposition." ^ It has frequently been thought that 
in this proposition Wollaston is just simply saying that 
there is another way of asserting or denying truth. He 
seems to have anticipated the danger of being misunder- 
stood here and tried to safeguard against it. It is true 
that he says that ^'things may be denied to be what they are 
by deeds," but that he is doing something other than merely 
describing a form of existential judgment is quite evident 
from his own statement. After saying that "there is mean- 
ing in many acts and gestures" and that "everybody under- 
stands weeping, laughing, shrugs, frowns, these are a sort 
of universal language"; he then goes on to say: "But these 
instances do not come up to my meaning." Why do not 
these instances of actions which either affirm or deny things 
to be what they are come up to his meaning? I think it is 
because he is not referring to the different methods that 
may be employed to convey meaning, to affirm or to deny 
the conformity of thoughts with things. He is not dealing 

•WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 
•Ibid., p. 8. 



S6 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

with theoretical matters at all, but with moral considera- 
tions. "There are many acts," he says, "of other kinds," 
that is, acts different from acts of the pantomime variety. 
"There are," he says, "many acts of other kinds, such as 
constitute the character of a man's conduct in life, which 
have in nature, and would be taken by any indifferent judge 
to have a signification, and to imply some proposition, as 
plainly to be understood as if it were declared in words ; and 
therefore if what such acts declare to be, is not, they must 
contradict truth, as much as any false proposition, or as- 
sertion can.'* ^^ Wollaston tried to define truth in Propo- 
sition II, while in Proposition III he sought to explicate 
goodness by comparing it to truth. It is here that he has 
been so much misunderstood. This is particularly unfor- 
tunate, because it constitutes the very crux of his argument. 
For, as Ueberweg well says, the entire book is an analogous 
treatment of morality. "The characteristic of this treatise 
is that it makes virtue to consist in acting according to 
truth." 11 

The position I wish to maintain is that Wollaston does not 
identify truth and goodness. In his system morality is 
thought of as really affirming a true relationship, but that is 
not by any means saying that morality is mere assent to a 
true proposition. It is as true as such assent, and immor- 
ality is as false as the denial of a self-evidently true propo- 
sition. The two processes are very different, the one is 
merely intellectual while the other is moral. There is a 
great difference between intellectual assent, which is deter- 
mined by the nature of things, and a moral act, which is 
contingent on free choice. The value judgment embodied in 
a moral act is expressive of the self and of character, while 
the intellectual assent to a true relation involved in an 
existential judgment has no such connection with the will, 
the character, or the self. It has been said that Wollaston 
just reduces morality to existential judgments, when he 
says, "If what such acts declare to be, is not, they must 
contradict truth, as much as any false proposition or asser- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 
^ Ueberweg, His. of Phil., vol. II, p. 382. 



TTi^ Religion of Nature Delineated 37 

tion can." This cannot be said with justice for Wollaston 
is very insistent upon the fact that here he is talking about 
"such acts as constitute the character of a man's conduct 
in life." 12 

Just what is Wollaston saying when he says, "if what such 
acts declare to be is not, they must contradict truth as 
much as any false proposition or assertion can".'* He cer- 
tainly is not saying that this is but another way of denying 
or contradicting truth, but rather is he not saying that 
immorality is as contradictory as a false proposition? The 
difference is this, — a man cannot deny a true proposition. 
As intelligent beings, we can but assent to what convinces 
us is true. But, thanks to our freedom, we can act con- 
tradictory. The immoral act is not a lie, as many of Wol- 
laston's critics accuse him of teaching, it is not a contradic- 
tory existential judgment; but, what he says is, that it is 
just as absurd as to fail to assent to truth when we recog- 
nize a true relation. Wollaston does not say that moral 
deeds are propositions. What he does say is that a moral 
deed is an affirmation of true relations, and that an immoral 
act is a denial of these relations. This interpretation is 
found in the unsigned article on Wollaston in the Britannica : 
"He claims originality for his theory that moral evil is the 
practical denial of a true proposition and moral good the 
affirmation of it." ^^ This I consider to be one of the best 
statements of his position that I have found. The word 
"practical" is generally left out, with the result that an ab- 
solutely different meaning is given. "Practical" is really 
the key word in the statement of his moral theory, and when 
it is accentuated immorality is not defined as the denial of a 
true proposition. The theory, rather, is that immorality 
implies the truth of the proposition and then acts as if it 
were not true, or "practically" denies, the admittedly true, 
proposition. 

There are two kinds of acts, says Wollaston. He, then, 
tries to show the very great difference between them. The 
one kind of acts, he says, in effect, merely expresses intel-# 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

" Anon., Art. on Wollaston in Britan., vol. 28, p. 776. 



38 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

lectual meaning: "It is certain there is a meaning in many 
acts and gestures." The other kind of acts are moral acts, 
"such as constitute the character of a man's conduct in life." 
The very same action may, under different circumstances, 
have these two very different meanings. A bow of the head, 
for example, may be merely a gesture expressing, in sign 
language, the proposition to-day is Tuesday. At another 
time and under other circumstances the action might have 
a moral quality, in that the one who performed such an act 
might thereby deny essential human relations, might thereby 
will the destruction of human society. In so acting, says 
Wollaston, one "would contribute his share towards the in- 
troduction of universal disorder and misery," and would for 
his part deny human life to be what it is, would deny human 
society to be what it is.^* 

Illustrative of this point I wish to give some material 
which I found in a work on criminal psychology. Gross 
says: "Purely physiological conditions operate in many di- 
rections, such as blushing, trembling, laughing, weeping; 
and very few men want to show their minds openly to their 
friends, so that they see no reason for co-ordinating their 
symbolic bodily expressions. Nevertheless, they do so, and 
not since yesterday, but for thousands of years. Hence 
definite expressions have been transmitted for generations. 
Characteristically, the desire to fool others has its predeter- 
mined limitations, so that it often happens that simple and 
significant gestures contradict words when the latter are 
false." Gross takes as a case a man who "assured us," in 
words, of course, "that he lived very peaceably with his 
neighbors and at the same time clinched his fist. The latter 
meant ill will toward the neighbor while the words did not." 
Gross is saying that gesture language, involuntarily, speaks 
the truth, oftentimes, even when our words are trying to 
deceive.^^ 

Clarke is, perhaps, a little clearer than Wollaston on this 
point of the relation of the intellectual and the moral. "The 
only difference," he says, "is that assent to a plain specu- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 8 and 143. 
"Gross, Kriminal Psycbologie, Part I, Topic 3. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 39 

lative truth, is not in a man's power to withhold ; but to act 
according to the plain right and reason of things, this he 
may, by the natural liberty of his will, forbear. But the 
one he ought to do; and 'tis as much his plain and indis- 
pensable duty; as the other he cannot but do, and 'tis the 
necessity of his nature to do it." '^^ His thought is that as 
assent to plain intellectual truth is necessary to sanity, so to 
act in conformity, while not necessitated, is necessary to the 
fulfillment of life relations and so to moral self-realization. 

Garve undertook to offer an interpretation of this para- 
graph of Wollaston's treatise and for some reason inclosed 
his discussion in quotation marks. These statements of Garve 
are for the most part fair to the teachings of Wollaston, 
except on this one point of the relation of the intellectual 
and the moral. Garve begins with the words "Wollaston 
sagt," implying that what follows is quoted from the work 
of Wollaston, so it is not to be wondered at that Von Hart- 
mann and other German writers should think that they were 
quoting from Wollaston, in form of Garve's supposed trans- 
lation, when they are only quoting from Garve's interpreta- 
tive remarks. "Every action is good which expresses a true 
proposition. Truth is the highest. To recognize truth and 
to represent it in one's words and deeds, alive and effective, 
is the ultimate end of man. The ability to recognize truth 
makes a man a rational being, and through the endowments 
of his nature to express truth also in action he becomes a 
moral being ( durch die Anlagen seiner Natur, Wahrheit auch 
in Handlungen auszudriicken, wird er ein sittliches We- 
sen)." ^'^ So far I have no fault to find with the interpreta- 
tion, but as he proceeds we see that he interprets the Wol- 
lastonian Ethics as based on an essential identification of 
the intellectual and the moral. He says : "As man expresses 
his ideas and words by means of language he can indicate 
them also and communicate them to others by means of ac- 
tions. This is clear to everybody in the form of gestures, 
but only the most attentive observer can discover that every 

" Clarke, Evidences, p. 188. 

" Garve, Uebersicht der vornehmsten Principien Sittenl., p. 17^. Von 
Hartmann, Phanomenologie des Sittlichin Bewusstseins, p. 345. 



40 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

action without exception expresses a certain proposition 
(dass jede Handlung, ohne Ausnahme, einen gewissen Satz 
ausdriickt)." Garve, it is clear, does not make any distinc- 
tion between gestures and other forms of action and so misses 
Wollaston's meaning entirely. This is even more evident in 
what he next says : "In der Wahrheit oder Unwahrheit dieses 
Satzes liegt die Sittlichkeit oder Unsittlichkeit der Hand- 
lung." ^^ This is not Wollaston's meaning at all. The mor- 
ality does not lie in the truth or falsity of the proposition 
but in the truth or falsity of the action. The proposition 
is just as true when the action is false as when it is true, 
otherwise there would be no inconsistency and consequently 
no wrong. 

Garve gets the big idea in the Ethics of Wollaston, namely, 
that the criterion is objective, that the natures of things de- 
termine how they should be treated. Wollaston does insist 
that inaninmte objects, animals and human beings by their 
very different natures indicate that they should be treated 
very differently. Since animals have feelings this must be 
taken into consideration in our treatment of them, and since 
man has both feelings and reason he should be treated as 
possessing both. Wollaston says that if mankind be differ- 
entiated from the rest of the animal kingdom by reason, then 
the rational nature of man must be a large factor in the 
determination of the treatment properly to be accorded a 
man.^^ Garve, however, fails to understand Wollaston be- 
cause he seems to try to translate an immoral action into 
some kind of false proposition. "If I torment an animal," 
he has Wollaston say, "I express thereby the proposition, I 
take this animal to be a being without feeling and therefore 
I treat it like my table or a stone." In torturing an animal 
I do not thereby express the proposition "Ich halte diess 
Thier fiir ein empfindungsloses Wesen." On the contrary, 
I know, and must as an intelligent being declare, it to be a 
creature with feelings. It is true, that I "behandle es daher 
so, wie meinen Tisch, oder einen Stein." The same can be 
said of the next statement he puts into Wollaston's mouth: 

^* Garve, Uebersicht der vornehmsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 173. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 27 and 128. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 41 

"If I make a slave of a person I express thereby the propo- 
sition ; this man is an irrational being, which I can use for 
my purpose like horses and oxen without his consent." ^^ 
But by treating a man like horses and oxen I only act as if 
he were an irrational being. I do not by my inhuman treat- 
ment of him make the declaration "dieser Mensch ist ein 
vernunftloses Wesen." In fact, implicit in my mistreatment 
of the man is the indubitable truth that the man is a rational 
being, otherwise there would be no inconsistency in my be- 
havior. This same confusion of intellectual contradiction 
with moral inconsistency appears in the generalization which 
he has Wollaston make: "Wenn ich ungerecht handle, so 
erklare ich dadurch, dass ich mich fiir kein Glied der Mensch- 
lichen Gesellshaft halte." ^^ Wollaston does not take the 
position that when a man acts immorally he, thereby, de- 
clares that he does not consider himself a member of human 
society. He has, it is true, acted as if there were no human 
society and as if he were no member thereof; but the im- 
morality does not consist in the denial of the evidently true, 
as Garve thinks. The immorality consist, rather, in the 
inconsistency of the actions with the truth. 

John Clarke, Wollaston's contemporary, says that he is 
not at all sure "that all immoral actions deny more truth 
than they affirm," so it cannot, he thinks, be argued that they 
are for that reason immoral. ^^ As many truths, he says, 
could be affirmed in regard to "any species of vicious action 
... as for the denial of it." In the first place, I would 
answer, it is not the position of Wollaston that immorality 
is just a denial of true propositions. In the second place, 
considering truth in the broad sense as true to the relations 
and meanings of life, as Wollaston does, John Clarke cer- 
tainly cannot deny that vicious actions are essentially false. 
They are, to be sure, in conformity to some particular truth, 
but they contradict the larger truths and deny the indis- 
soluble unity of life and the world. Wollaston anticipates 
this objection, when he says that there are many true propo- 

'" Garve, Uebersicht der vornehmsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 173. 

« Ibid., p. 174. 

=»»J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 19. 



42 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

sitions which imply no moral relations, since persons are 
not involved.^^ 

In regard to the contention of Wollaston "that men may 
by their actions deny truth," John Clarke says, that the 
only meaning this can have is that "actions . . . are ex- 
pressive ... of propositions," that they are ways "of con- 
veying . . . sense ... to the minds of others." ^ This 
is the same confusion we found in Garve. The confusion is 
due to the failure to understand that Wollaston speaks of 
actions which express merely intellectual meaning, such as 
gestures and pantomimes, and also of actions expressive of 
character, moral action. This confusion is made evident by 
what follows. Clarke says that all that Wollaston can mean 
is that an action may convey a false impression "even where 
a person has no intention by his action of conveying any 
such sense to the minds of others." ^^ Clarke goes on to say 
that "the difficulty of making a determination will grow with 
the number of significations the same action may have . . . 
to different people." The civility of a sharper, for ex- 
ample, makes a very different impression upon a green-horn 
to that made upon a man of the world. His actions, how- 
ever, are precisely the same in the two instances. ^^ "But," 
says Clarke, "supposing actions rightly denominated im- 
moral did really imply a denial of the truth ... a denial 
of things to be what they are; yet how will it follow from 
such a denial, that those actions therefore are truly and 
properly immoral, that is contrary to the will and good 
pleasure of God, declared by the voice of reason, or the 
light of nature?" ^"^ 

Having defined truth and goodness and determined the 
nature of each Wollaston, next, proceeds to illustrate each. 
His first case is an example of an act which affirms a false 
proposition to be true or denies a true proposition to be 
false. It is that of a body of soldiers firing upon another 
body thinking them to be enemies when they are friends. 

2^ J. Clarke, etc., from p. 19. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 31. 
** J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 20. 
^Ibid., p. 19. 
2« Ibid., p. 21. 
^^ Ibid., p. 35. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 43 

This case of the soldiers illustrates actions that express or 
(feny true relations, but not acts expressive of character, 
since they are based on error. True, as Wollaston says, 
the truth or falsity "does not depend upon the affirmer's 
knowledge or ignorance" ; because words have a fixed mean- 
ing and do, as a matter of fact, conform, "agree or disagree 
to that, concerning which the affirmation is made." But is 
he not confusing the intellectual and the moral when he 
goes on to say : "The thing is the same still, if into the place 
of words be substituted actions?" No, for actions of this 
kind could have no moral character and so would be ac- 
tions of the pantomime order expressing meaning, not char- 
acter. "The salute here was in nature the salute of an 
enemy, but should have been the salute of a friend ; therefore 
it implied a falsity," but no moral character attaches to it. 
This, I take it, like acts of the gesture and pantomime va- 
riety, "do not come up" to Wollaston's "meaning." ^^ 

Wollaston, then, gives instances of the "acts of the other 
kind, such as constitute the character of a man's conduct 
in life." "When Popilius Laenas solicited to have Cicero 
proscribed, and that he might find him out and be his exe- 
cutioner, would not his carriage have sufficiently signified 
to any one, who was ignorant of the case, that Tully either 
was some very bad man, and deserved capital punishment; 
or had some way grievously injured this man; or at least had 
not saved his life, nor had as much reason to expect his 
service and good offices upon occasion, as he ever had to ex- 
pect TuUy's? And all these things being false, were not his 
behavior and actions expressive of that which was false, or 
contradictions to truth? It is certain he acted as if those 
things had been true, which were not true, and as if those 
had not been true which were true ( in this consisted the fault 
of his ingratitude) ; and if he in words had said they were 
true or not true, he had done no more than talk as if they 
were so ; why then should not to act as if they were true 
or not true, when they were otherwise, contradict truth as 
much as to say they were so, when they were not so." ^^ 

^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 9. 
* Ibid., p. 9. 



44 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

John Clarke thinks that this criterion of Wollaston which 
undertakes to explicate morality in terms of truth is a fail- 
ure. He thinks that the matter of agreement to truth is 
ethically speaking irrelevant and undertakes to prove this 
by a consideration of WoUaston's own cases. Clarke says 
"It would be easy to multiply instances of actions, very 
serious in their significations, some of which would be agree- 
able to truth, others not." Take Wollaston's case of Popil- 
lius Laenas' solicitation to have Cicero proscribed. The 
absolute irrelevance of conformity or non-conformity of ac- 
tions to truth is quite apparent, he thinks. Clarke says that 
by Wollaston's own confession Laenas' action had various 
significations "to any one, who was ignorant of the case," 
namely, "that Tully either was some very bad man," or "had 
not saved his life," or "had in some way grievously injured 
this man." Clarke asks "what would that carriage of his 
have signified to any one that was not ignorant of the case, 
but knew Tully to be 'a person of eminent parts, learning, 
eloquence and virtue, that had merited highly from his 
country, and particularly from Laenas, whose life he had 
saved? Why 'tis as clear as the sun can be at noonday, 
that to such a person it would have had no one of those 
various significations, but only this, that Laenas was what 
the world calls an ungrateful profligate villain.' " ^^ I am 
very sure that Clarke has not refuted Wollaston. He has 
not proved the irrelevance of the principle of agreeableness 
to truth. To be sure the actions of Laenas would have had 
a much more definite signification to one familiar to the case; 
but Wollaston says, that to even one entirely ignorant of 
the case, his "carriage" clearly "signified" that he was act- 
ing inconsistently with relations of a friendly kind obtaining 
between Cicero and himself. Wollaston is only concerned 
to say that Laenas' actions were unfitting to the circum- 
stances, that his action would naturally lead one ignorant 
of the circumstances to infer that they were quite otherwise. 
In a word his "carriage" was indicative of evil, not good. 
But says Clarke "since the same actions have various sig- 
nificances . . . our author's new scheme of morality appears 
^ J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 24. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 45 

clogged with insuperable difficulties," because we cannot tell 
"what significations we are to have regard to, in forming 
a judgment of the morality or immorality of human ac- 
tions." ^^ No, Wollaston says the relations concerning per- 
sons are the ones to have particular "regard to" although 
everything should be treated as what it is. However various 
the significations of the actions of Laenas to the different 
casual observers they made one general impression.^^ 

In regard to these two instances we could wish more 
clearness on one point, namely, that of making clear that 
in the first example the objectively inappropriate act, act 
not in conformity to the nature of things, was done ignor- 
antly and innocently. Whereas in the second instance the 
objectively inappropriate and incongruous act was done in- 
telligently and wilfully, and was, consequently, not only 
objectively bad but also morally wrong. Wollaston makes 
the distinction but not as clearly as he might have done. He 
should have emphasized the fact that in the first instance 
there was conformity of acts to the nature of things as they 
were thought to be, while in the second instance the non- 
conformity was in the face of known facts. He undoubtedly 
intended for these two instances to show that immorality is 
as self-contradictory as intellectual contradiction. "If he 
in words had said that they were true or not true, he had 
done no more than talk as if they were so ; why then should 
not to act as if they were true or not true, when they were 
otherwise, contradict truth as much as to say they were so, 
when they were not so." ^^ I think that Wollaston labors 
unnecessarily hard to try to show that a truth can be denied 
by actions as well as by words, unless he means thereby 
more than the mere fact that there are significant acts. 

I think that these two illustrations answer the objection 
that the intention of the actor has nothing to do with the 
morality of the act. I think, however, that his lack of clar- 
ity in distinguishing between the two types of actions was 
responsible for the false interpretation. John Clarke, in 

"J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 25. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 31. 
» Ibid., p. 9. 



46 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

Wollaston's lifetime, offered this criticism of his system. 
John Clarke says that "actions whether words are deeds can- 
not be properly said to deny or affirm anything," since 
"affirming and denying are actions" the terms are only "ap- 
plicable to agents." ^* Clarke says that the objection may 
be made that this is a "nice distinction." He answers that 
"it is not more nice than necessary" because one cannot 
affirm or deny without an intention to do so. "A man is 
then, and then only, said to affirm or deny a thing when he 
conveys a proposition in his own mind to the minds of others ; 
as expressing his own sense of apprehension or persuasion 
of the agreement or disagreement of things." ^^ Clarke says 
that it matters not what meaning his words or actions may 
"excite in the minds of those that hear the one, or see the 
other" a man can only be said to affirm or deny when he 
intends to do so. He takes the case of "orders given in a 
nation under the apprehension of an invasion from an ene- 
my." ^® The order was "that beacons should be fired, or 
lights set up ... to give warning of the enemy's approach." 
The lighting of the beacons "would be equivalent to the 
proposition, the enemy is come ; and might be said thereby to 
affirm a truth, if the enemy was come, and a lie if he was 
not, because this was really meant and intended." But 
suppose some one ignorant of the orders should fire a bea- 
con, "he could not be said thereby to *affirm that the enemy 
has come,' notwithstanding their actions would necessarily 
convey that proposition to the minds of such as, being ac- 
quainted with the orders, should see the lights ; and that for 
this reason only, because he had not the least intention to 
affirm anything." This is a case like the first one mentioned 
by Wollaston. It is illustrative of actions of the non-moral 
type, illustrative of actions of the gesture or pantomime 
variety which express only meaning. Wollaston is as equally 
insistent as John Clarke that no moral quality attaches to 
actions of this kind. Such evil as results from mistakes of 
this kind does not constitute moral but only natural evil, 

" J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 6. 
«Ibid., p. 9. 
» Ibid., p. 10. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 47 

So of course an innocent action cannot "deny" in the ethical 
sense of the term. 

Wollaston anticipates this objection when he says: "I 
la}^ this down then as a fundamental maxim, that whoever 
acts as if things were so, or not so, doth by his acts declare, 
that they are so or not so ; as plainly as he could by words, , 

and with more reality. And if things are otherwise, his acts ' 

contradict those propositions, which assert them to be as 
they are." ^"^ Now John Clark argues that if one is mis- 
taken he does not really act. He violates truth, he says, 
but he does not act in any moral sense. He thinks that 
Wollaston fails to make this all-important distinction. I 
am very sure that he does make the distinction, for he says 
that "No act of any being, to whom moral good and evil is 
imputable, that interferes with any true proposition, or 
denies anything to be as it is, can be right." ^^ And "to 
whom" are "moral good and evil . . . imputable?" This :| 

he answers precisely as Clarke does ; "That act, which may 
be denominated morally good or evil, must be the act of a 
being capable of distinguishing, choosing, and acting for 
himself; ... an intelligent and free agent. Because in 
proper speaking no act at all can be ascribed to that which 
is not indued with these capacities." ^^ 

John Clarke thinks that the rightness or wrongness of 
actions is determined by the intention of the actor and he 
understands Wollaston to teach that "the immorality of the 
action is exclusive of the intention," that he who has no 
intention to deny the truth is equally guilty with the one 
who knows and intends to deny it.^^ "If therefore nobody 
can be said to affirm or deny anything, without an intention 
so to do, I doubt the greatest villains, will, according to 
Mr. Wollaston's doctrine, stand discharged from the guilt 
of the greatest of crimes ; since they are so far from intend- 
ing the denial of any truth, any true proposition whatso- 
ever, by the rapine and murder they are guilty of, that 

•'Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 13. 

*• Ibid., Prop. IV, p. 13. 

" Ibid., Sec. I, Intro., p. 6. 

*» J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 12. 



48 The Ethics of William Wollasfon 

they never so much as once imagine, their actions have 
any such tendency, meaning or significance at all." ^^ Clarke 
must, I think, admit that the criminal is conscious of deny- 
ing many significant life relations. A villain who demands 
a man's money does not, he says, "intend thereby the denial 
of any truth." He says "the truth that the money belongs 
to the traveller" is not, as Wollaston claims, "denied by such 
an action." Tlie action has rather the contrary signfica- 
tion.^^ To be sure the very essence of wrong consists in 
denying by actions, or "practically denying" that which 
must be assented to intellectually. The trouble is Clarke 
thinks that there is only one way to deny truth and strictly 
speaking there is only one way, but treating things as they 
are not denies by action that which must be assented to as 
fact. 

John Clarke next offers a dilemmatical argument against 
Wollaston's doctrine: "Take it which way you will, whether 
an intention to deny the truth be made necessary or not 
necessary to the immorality of an action, Mr. Wollaston's 
doctrine cannot stand. Upon the former supposition, the 
greatest rogues will be excusable in the vilest of actions for 
want of this intention to deny the truth, as it is very certain 
that they have it not. . . . And upon the supposition that 
an intent to deny truth is not necessary to the immorality 
of an action, but that it is sufficient to render an action 
immoral, that it has a meaning inconsistent with some truth, 
though the agent has not the least intention of denying any 
truth; I say upon this supposition it will be a crime, and as 
great a crime to deny the truth through ignorance, as to 
do it wittingly and knowingly, with a perverse and malicious 
intention." ^^ I would like to ask Clarke what the intention 
of the rogue is if it is not to take something for his own 
that belongs to some one else? The rogue, by his action, 
does practically deny truth, for he denies things and rela- 
tions to be as they are, and he intends to deny these essential 
relations. Wollaston, as much as Clarke, believes that the 

«J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 11. 
« Ibid., p. 11. 
« Ibid., p. 13. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 49 

morality of an action is dependent upon the intention of the 
agent, in the sense that no act could be said to be good with- 
out this good intention. His position is that all facts must 
be considered and that an act is not really good, in the high- 
est sense, unless the intention as well as the results are good. 
Intentions as well as expected consequences must enter into 
the motivation.^* This is not, however, inconsistent with an 
objective conception of morality, for by the objectivity of 
Ethics we only mean that the real natures of things deter- 
mine what our intentions ought to be. The good man is one 
who strives to conform to the nature of things. 

That my interpretation of WoUaston is the correct one 
is made even more evident by his third instance. In this 
case a man promises that he will never do a thing and then 
does it. The act, Wollaston says, interferes with his prom- 
ise and is contrary to it, and is as contradictory as saying 
that A made the promise and then straightway say that 
he did not make it. True, the proposition is as much denied 
by A's behavior, as it would be by an actual verbal denial; 
but that is very different from saying that, morally or 
otherw^ise, they are the same kind of denials. If he thought 
that they were the same, why should he, over and over again, 
mention both kinds? He, clearly, it seems to me, means 
that moral inconsistency is a form of inconsistency ; but he 
does not mean to identify it with the intellectual inconsis- 
tency of self-contradictory propositions. "If then the be- 
havior of A be inconsistent with the agreement mentioned in 
the former proposition, that proposition is as much denied 
by A's behavior, as it can be by the latter, or any other 
proposition. Or thus, if one proposition imports or con- 
tains that which is contrary to what is contained in another, 
it is said to contradict this other, and denies the existence 
of what is contained in it. Just so if one act imports that 
which is contrary to the import of another, it contradicts 
this other and denies its existence. In a word A by his 
actions denies the engagements to which he hath subjected 
himself." *^ Acts that do this, though, are not acts of the 

** WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 
« Ibid., p. 11. 



50 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

gesture or pantomime variety which are but forms of lan- 
guage; but are "such acts as constitute the character of a 
man's conduct in life" and have a moral "signification." 
Wollaston says "In common speech we say some actions are 
insignificant, which would not be sense, if there were not 
some acts that are significant, that have a tendency and a 
meaning." Acts, he is saying, have a significance for life 
and character, a moral signification, as well as intellectual 
significance. True, he again uses an analogy to make clear 
his meaning, and, as before, he succeeds in clouding up his 
meaning instead of clearing it up. Actions, he sa3's, are 
significant or insignificant ; "And this is as much as can be 
said of articulate sounds, that they are either significant 
or insignificant." Just as some articulate sounds have sig- 
nificance and some have not, so of actions. He is, of course, 
using significance in two very different senses, — moral and 
intellectual.*^ 

The failure of Wollaston to clearly differentiate between 
moral and intellectual signification constitutes the ground 
of the criticism by John Clarke. He says that in regard to 
this case of A making a promise to B not to do a thing, and 
then doing it, there are ten equally possible significations. 
Suppose one of the significations to be true, the rest would 
of necessity all be false. Now, according to Wollaston's 
rule, thinks Clarke, the actions, however innocent, must be 
condemned as immoral ; because "no act that interferes with 
any true proposition can be right" and this one "has so 
many various meanings, all inconsistent with the truth." ^"^ 
But none of the nine possible significations, are, as a matter 
of fact, true, so no action can be in violation of them. 

I wish to mention one more of the illustrations of Wollas- 
ton, because it is the original source of the most common 
criticism against him, namely, that he reduces all immorality 
to lying. Isaac told Abimelek that Rebekah was his sister, 
but after this the king saw Isaac sporting and taking con- 
jugal liberties with her. These acts, says Wollaston, denied 
that she was his sister and affirmed her to be either his wife 

** Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 11. 

« J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat, Delin.," pp. 27-30, 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 51 

or concubine. A man may so live that his "whole conduct 
breathes untruth. May we not say" of such a man "that he 
lives a lie.?" Wollaston does not say, as his critics accuse 
him of saying, that bad acts are just different ways of ly- 
ing; — that would reduce all actions to the gesture and pan- 
tomime type of actions. To act a lie means simply to be 
false to significant life relations and meanings, and certainly 
this is what he means by saying "his whole conduct breathes 
untruth" and "he lives a lie." The immoral act in this case 
was literal lying. Isaac, knowingly and deliberately, con- 
fused ontological predicates in his statement to Abimelek 

of the relations that obtained between Rebekah and him- 
self.48 

Wollaston recapitulates the argument of this division, and 
this recapitulation might well serve as an epitome of his 
analogous treatment of truth and goodness: "I lay this 
down as a fundamental maxim, that whoever acts as if things 
were so, or not so, doth by his acts declare that they are so 
or not so ; as plainly as he could by words, and with more 
reality."*® Is not his meaning very clear.'* "As plainly": 
the contradiction is as evident, but not the same kind of 
thing, ^or the one is logical and the other ethical in character. 
He says "with more reality," because intellectually speaking, 
true propositions cannot be denied. Immoral acts do not 
deny true propositions to be intellectually true, but they 
do "practically" deny them to be true. In the practical 
denial of that to which one intellectually assents consists 
the inconsistency of immorality. The critics, from the time 
of Garve and Clarke to the present, have interpreted this 
passage as meaning that immoral acts are false judgments 
in regard to the nature of things. ^^ 

IV 

In this paragraph Wollaston defines morality negatively 
by saying that contradictory acts cannot be right. "No 

« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 12. 
« Ibid., p. 13. 
^» Ibid., p. 13. 



52 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

act of any being, to whom moral good or evil is imputable, 
that interferes with any true proposition, or denies any- 
thing to be as it is, can be right." ^^ 

1. Wollaston's first proof of this proposition is as fol- 
lows : "If that proposition, which is false, be wrong, that 
act which implies such a proposition, or is founded in it, 
cannot be right ; because it is the very proposition itself in 
practice." Mere propositions cannot be right or wrong, 
if right and wrong are given an ethical connotation. Were 
this sentence alone considered we might think that Wollaston 
is using "wrong" with an ethical connotation, for he does 
use "right" with an undoubted ethical connotation in the 
same sentence. In the very next paragraph, however, he 
makes it very clear that his use of the word "wrong" is not 
moral but natural and intellectual. This constitutes his 
second. John Clarke very properly takes Wollaston to task 
for the two meanings given to "wrong." He says "The 
terms of right and wrong are not applicable to propositions 
at all, in any moral sense. . . . Right and wrong are de- 
nominations given to things, upon account of their agree- 
ment or disagreement with some rule, to which they are re- 
ferred, and by which they are judged of. Now, the only 
rule to which propositions, considered as true or false, are 
referred, and by which they are judged of, is the nature and 
existence of things. Such propositions as are conformable 
thereto may be, and are properly called 'right,' those that 
are not, 'wrong.' " ^^ Clarke says that this means that 
Wollaston's proof will reduce to the "trifling" statement 
"that the proposition which is false is false." Wollaston had 
set out to prove, "not that actions which imply denial of the 
truth, cannot be declarative of the truth they deny, . . . but 
that such actions are immoral." ^^ 

2. "Those propositions, which are true, and express 
things as they are, express the relation between the subject 
and the attribute as it is ; that is, this is either affirmed or 
denied of that according to the nature of the relation. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 13. ' 

«• J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 37. 
" Ibid., p. 39. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 63 

And, further, this relation is determined and fixed by the na- 
tures of the things themselves." In other words one cannot 
deny such relations, as actually existent, and be considered 
sane. Then follows the moral part of the argument : "There- 
fore nothing can interfere with any proposition that is true, 
but it must likewise interfere with nature, and consequently 
be unnatural or wrong in nature." ^^ In criticising this 
second proof that nothing can interfere with truth "but it 
must likewise interfere with nature" and so be wrong, John 
Clarke says, that "interfering with' nature . . . can here 
signify" only "false," not moral "wrong." So that Wol- 
laston's way of proving actions , . . that deny truth to be 
immoral, ... is but affirming over and over again . . . 
that actions that deny truth deny truth.^^ I do not see the 
special force of this objection, because saying that truth is 
conformity to nature is saying something more than that 
truth is truth. It is saying that truth is objective, and by 
saying that morality is in conformity to nature or to truth 
we are saying that morality is also objective. 

3. For a third argument for his thesis that contradictory 
acts cannot be right, he says, "if there is a Supreme Being, 
upon whom the existence of the world depends," then there 
can be nothing in it but "what he causes"; then "to own 
things to be as they are is to own what he causes ; . . . and 
this is to take things as he planned them in his constitution 
of the world." The duty of man consists in submitting to his 
will "revealed in the book of nature." The "owning of 
things, in all our conduct, to be as they are, is obedience 
... to the author of nature." Wollaston's conception of 
the place of the will in morality is made quite evident here: 
"The relation that lies between this and that is of such a 
nature that one may be affirmed of the other, this is true; 
but yet to me it shall not be so ; I will not act as if it were 
so." ^^ Wollaston says that one can say for himself ; I will 
not follow the laws of nature, "even existence shall be non- 
existence, when my pleasure requires. Such an impious 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 13. 

"J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 39. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 14. 



64i The Ethics of William Wollaston 

declaration as this attends every voluntary infraction of 
truth." ^^ What Wollaston is, here, saying, in effect, is 
this "conformity to nature" is the standard of both truth 
and goodness ; but "to own things to be as they are" in our 
thinking is necessitated, while the "owning of things, in all 
our conduct, to be as they are" is a matter of freedom. 
This constitutes the essential difference between intellectual 
and moral relations. John Clarke's criticism of this point 
fails to take this into consideration. He thinks that every- 
thing in the world is as God would have it be, failing to con- 
sider the ill effects wrought by men through the mis-use of 
their freedom. John Clarke says that for the rich to relieve 
the poor is not "taking things as God has given them," but 
"altering things that God has caused or permitted to be." 
The neglect of the poor more truly "leaves things in the 
condition he has caused or permitted to be, and which his 
constitution of things suffered to remain unaltered. ^^ 

4*. The fourth argument for the thesis, that contradic- 
tory acts cannot be right, is that things cannot be denied to 
be what they are without contradicting axiomatic and eternal 
truth, such as "everything is what it is." Now there are 
immutable truths, which have "always subsisted in the di- 
vine mind," the denial of these is a denial of God. The na- 
ture of things cannot be denied existentially, but only mor- 
ally. Intellectually we cannot deny the existence of things 
to be as they are, and morally things should be treated as 
they are. 

5. This fact is further emphasized: "Designedly to 
treat things as being what they are not is the greatest pos- 
sible absurdity." To get Wollaston's meaning we must get 
the full force of the word "designedly." The kind of con- 
tradiction which immorality makes, is that of "designedly" 
treating "things as what they are not." This is contradic- 
tory, because one must, at the same time, assent to the truth, 
that is, admit things to be what they are. To act immorally 
is to act inconsistently, or as Wollaston expresses it, "to 
put bitter for sweet, darkness for light, crooked for straight. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 14. 

^J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 41. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 55 

It is to subvert all science, to renounce all sense of truth, 
and flatly to deny the existence of anything. For nothing 
can be true, nothing does exist, if things are not what they 
are"; and he who acts immorally, thinks Wollaston, prac- 
tically wills these contradictions an existence.^® 

John Clarke comments on the statement of Wollaston, 
"that to treat things as not being what they are is to put 
bitter for sweet, darkness for light, crooked for straight" 
by saying that this is just stating "that the denial of truth 
is the denial of truth. ^^ Clarke fails to consider that Wol- 
laston is saying that these matters of fact cannot be denied, 
"but that to treat things as not being what they are'* is as 
equally contradictory. He pretends to believe Wollaston 
to teach that immoral men have actually denied these mat- 
ters of fact. Wollaston means to say that to act immorally 
is as contradictory as "to put bitter for sweet, etc. It is to 
subvert all science, renounce all sense of truth, flatly to deny 
the existence of anything," but this Clarke takes literally. 
So he asks : "How has poor science done to subsist in the 
world, under such terrible and furious assaults, from the 
vices and follies of men?" ^^ This criticism is based entirely 
upon a confused interpretation. Leslie Stephen, laboring 
under the same mis-interpretation says that Wollaston is 
arguing the impossibility of immorality.^^ Both men fail 
to get the significance of the diff^erence between denying 
truth and "practically" denying it. The truth of the matter 
is that a man can, in practice, deny truth; but even while 
so acting one gives his assent to the truth of the proposition 
practically denied. The intellect is determined in its reac- 
tions, the will is not, consequently immorality is not impos- 
sible. So, in acts, one can deny what cannot be denied as 
truth. The contradiction consists in affirming and denying 
at the same time; and this is what all immorality does, for 
morality attaches only to intelligent and free acts.^^ 

Wollaston ends this paragraph by an illustration of 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 

" J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 44. 

«*Ibid., p. 45. 

" L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., p. 7. 

" S. Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 188. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 14. 



56 The Ethics of William Wollaston 



5> 



"designedly treating things as being what they are not. 
In this example he makes very clear the differentia of immor- 
ality. Immorality is as absurd, he says, as saying that 
things that are are not, as absurd as saying that A is at 
the same time both A and not-A. But Wollaston does not 
say that all such practical denials of evident truth are 
immoral, and not all practical affirmations of evident truth 
are moral. The first sentence in the work of Wollaston 
states that there are good, bad and indifferent acts of men. 
These indifferent acts either conform to truth or conflict 
with truth. Mere conformity to some truth, then, does not 
make an act good. The mere violation of truth is not im- 
moral. The nature and importance of the truths conformed 
to or violated is an important factor in determining whether 
an act has moral character or whether it is morally indiffer- 
ent. It is true that Wollaston does say that he would have 
everything treated as what it is and that the thought of any 
truth suffering violation is shocking to him, still he grants 
that there are acts that are practically indifferent, morally 
considered.^* "To talk to a post, or otherwise treat it as if 
it was a man, would surely be reckoned an absurdity. Why .f^ 
because this is to treat it as being what it is not." It is, 
though, not immoral but only absurd to treat a post as a 
man. The converse, that is to treating a man as a post, 
constitutes immorality. He says "to treat a man as a post 
should ... be reckoned as bad," because it practically 
denies him to be a man and treats him "as if he had no sense 
and felt no injuries, which he doth feel." Treating a man 
as a post is bad and not only absurd, because it is acting 
towards him "as if to him pain and sorrow were not pain, 
happiness not happiness. This is what the cruel and unjust 
often do." ^^ It is quite certain that Wollaston does not 
here confuse the intellectual and the moral relations, what- 
ever he may do elsewhere. It is not immoral, but only ab- 
surd, to treat a post with the same consideration with which 
one would treat a man ; but to treat a man as a post is a 
very different kind of thing, for such treatment violates the 

«* Wollaston, Reli. Nat. Delin., pp. 20 and 23. 
« Ibid., p. 15. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 57 

nature of humanity. The one is merely acting incongru- 
ously or absurdly. The other action is equally incongruous 
and absurd, but since personality is the truth here violated 
the act is also morally bad. This instance also meets the 
criticism that Wollaston gives no consideration to feelings, 
for the immorality of treating a man as a post he makes to 
consist, largely, in the disregard of the man's feelings. ^^ 

6. His last argument for the truth of his proposition is 
as follows: "To deny things to be as they are is a trans- 
gression of the great law of our nature, the law of reason." 
When we choose something contrary to truth, that is, make 
a moral choice which contradicts the true nature of things 
we thereby violate reason: "For truth cannot be opposed, 
but reason must be violated." Wollaston here, gives us his 
idea of conscience: "If I may judge by what I feel within 
myself, the least truth cannot be contradicted without much 
reluctance; even to see others disregard it "does something 
more than displease; it is shocking." It violates the law of 
our being, our rational nature. ^^ 



In this paragraph Wollaston says that truth is as much 
violated by sins of omission as by sins of commission. He 
says that by omissions, or failing to act when one ought to 
act, a true proposition is as much denied as by acts incon- 
sistent with truth. In regard to these, however, he grants 
that "much more latitude must be allowed, and much must 
be allowed, and much must be left to every one's own judg- 
ment and ingenuity." There are many omissions "which are 
manifestly inconsistent with some true proposition, these 
must be wrong." The violation of solemn promises, for 
example, is a contradiction of truth. Then there is the sin 
of having low ideals of life. This is wrong, because it is 
"failing to have the life ends required by the nature of 
things." The failure to cultivate my mind is to "deny my 
mind to be what it is and knowledge to be what it is." This 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 
" Ibid., p. 15. 



58 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

principle does not mean, Wollaston says, that if I do not 
always give to the poor I am acting wrongly. There are 
times, he says, "when I might contradict truth by giving 
to a poor man." ^^ Many things are to be considered before 
we can pass a moral judgment in such cases. The existen- 
tial judgment, this man is poor is true in every case; but 
the moral judgment asserts, in addition, my relation to the 
case and to the problem of poverty in general. If my cir- 
cumstances are such that I can give something for charity 
and I fail to do so, then do I "deny the condition of the poor 
to be what it is and my own to be what it is." ^^ In a word, 
according to Wollaston, an uncharitable being is immoral 
in that he violates the real nature of things by not living 
up to his real self in all his relations to other real things. 
His general principle is that human beings are to always be 
treated as human beings, and when they are otherwise 
treated wrong is done them. Wollaston here comes rather 
close to Utilitarianism, but his criterion is more inclusive 
than that of the greatest happiness of the greatest number. 
John Clarke says that in this case Wollaston "blundered 
upon the manner of proof, commonly called petitio prin- 
cipii," not by saying that "the rich man's neglect of the 
poor" is "immoral, because it implies a denial of this truth, 
that the rich are obliged to relieve the poor" ; but on the 
ground that he denied his condition and that of the poor to 
be what they are. "The denial of property in the owner 
did so visibly imply the supposition of a law of nature, 
as the denial of obligation did." Clarke says that the prin- 
ciple of Wollaston would imply that the relief of the poor 
by the rich was a denial that the circumstances "are what 
they are," namely, that he is rich and they poor."^^ Clarke 
says that, according to Wollaston, the rich ought not to 
relieve the poor for that is denying the poor to be what they 
are. The poor should be left in the circumstances in which 
God has seen fit to place them. 

"" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 16. 

""Ibid., p. 17. 

"J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 34. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 59 

VI 

In this paragraph Wollaston emphasizes the necessity of 
considering all relations. The position is taken that a thing 
must be considered in all its relations before we can know 
what it is. The man who rides a stolen horse is acting in 
conformity with the nature of the horse in riding him, but 
in that the horse is stolen he violates the nature of the horse 
as some one's else property. Because each thing is several 
things, in that it has many relations, and the same of each 
and every person there are many conflicts of duties. "Here 
the importance of the truth on the one and the other side 
should be diligently compared. ... In short, when things 
are truly estimated, persons concerned, times, places, ends 
intended, and efl^ects that naturally follow, must be added 
to them." ^^ So it is all a matter of judgment, existential 
and value. In many life situations one does not know enough 
to act intelligently, and how is one to act morally without 
acting intelligently? One may say that, in such cases, con- 
science bids one be true to himself, but when this is given 
content it can only mean being true to one's relations. The 
significant thing to me is that Wollaston gives due place 
to both and rightly relates the a priori and the a posteriori 
elements in knowledge and in morality. Prior to all experi- 
ence we can say that a man ought to conform his life to 
the nature of things, and it is only experience that can tell 
him what these are. There is an absoluteness and a rela- 
tiveness about it. The form of morality is a priori and 
absolute; it is that there should be conformity of life, 
through freely willed acts, to reality. The content of 
morality is relative and a posteriori involving judgment both 
of the facts and of duty in respect to the facts : "Nothing 
can be true any further than it is compatible with other 
things that are true." '^^ 

Erdmann in commenting on this passage says that it is 
Wollaston's idea that every object must be judged, not in 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 18 and 20. 
" Ibid., p. 19. 



60 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

isolation, for this would give only a one-sided judgment; 
but "a person must consider, at the same time, all its rela- 
tions and must consider it in its totality. Otherwise we 
are not taking it as it is but only as it is partly and partly 
as it is not." ^^ He says that this is of the very greatest 
importance in evaluating an action and refers to Wollas- 
ton's own case of riding a horse which belongs to some 
one else. One's action is in conformity to the nature of 
things when the horse is considered only as a horse, but 
when the horse is considered as being a piece of property 
belonging to some one else then the action is seen to be in 
contradiction to the nature of things. Erdmann says that 
a proposition is true only when it considers a thing in its 
totality, "hence only that is really true which is in accord 
with the nature of the object and to act in accord with its 
nature is acting according to truth, that is, good (nur das 
ist wirklich wahr, was der Natur des Gegenstandes gamass 
ist, und seiner Natur gemass ihn zu behandeln, ist der Wahr- 
heit gemass, d,h. gut)." ^^ 

VII 

In this paragraph Wollaston merely says that it is right 
not to do wrong: "When any act would be wrong, the for- 
bearing that act must be right; likewise when the omission 
of anything would be wrong, the doing of it must be right. 
Because contrariorum contraria est ratio." ^^ 



VIII 

This proposition affirms the coincidence of good and right 
and of evil and wrong: "Moral good and evil are coincident 
with right and wrong. For that cannot be good, which is 
wrong ; nor that evil, which is right." ^^ The truth of this 
is not so apparent as would seem to be the case nor is it a 

" Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 116. 

'*Ibid., p. 116. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 

" Ibid., p. 19. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 61 

mere tautological statement. Right and wrong refer to 
the conformity of acts to the moral law, while good and evil 
refer to the conformity of acts to the nature of things. 

IX 

In this paragraph Wollaston takes the position that ther^ 
are degrees of good and evil and undertakes to reconcile 
this with the position that morality consists in acts that 
are conformable to truth. "Every act" of an intelligent 
free being and "all those omissions which interfere with 
truth . . . are evil in some degree or other." When he 
speaks of acts inconsistent with truth, he says, "I mean any 
truth, any true proposition, whether containing matter of 
speculation or plain fact. I would have everything taken 
to be what in fact and truth it is." Here Wollaston does 
identify truth and goodness, and gives ground for the 
criticism that he reduces all immorality to lying. But this 
passage must not be taken alone, and it must also be borne 
in mind that he is here discussing degrees of immorality. 
He can well say that every violation of truth is to some 
extent evil. He would say, I am sure, that even his rela- 
tively innocent case of a man speaking to a post is, to an 
extent, a violation of the nature of personality, in that 
the man who does that kind of thing is acting absurdly and 
is consequently not treating himself as a rational creature, 
and so the act is evil. He goes on to say, however, that 
"neither all evil nor all good actions are equal." '^'^ It might 
be argued that to make any difference in degrees of morality 
he must resort to another standard than that of conformity 
to truth. He says that the importance of the truth re- 
spected or violated deteniiines the degree of virtue or vice. 
"For neither all evil nor all good actions are equal. Those 
truths which they respect, though they are equally true, 
may comprise matters of very different importance; or 
more truths may be violated one way than another, and 
acts committed by the violation of them may be equally 
said to be crimes but not equal crimes." In his example, 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 22. 



62 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

however, he apparently resorts to the hedonistic criterion. 
He says that it is far worse to deprive a man of an estate 
than it is to steal a book from him, because the one is worth 
far more than the other, which means that the one "is 
capable of conferring more happiness than the other." "^^ 

One year after the death of Wollaston, Thomas Bott 
wrote a pamphlet criticizing his ethical philosophy. Bott 
confines his criticism almost entirely to this paragraph, 
which is perhaps the weakest, or, at least the one most open 
to misinterpretation, of any in the entire argument. Bott 
says: "What I design is to confine myself to the peculiar 
and principal notion of our author; and enquire whether 
it is right, or not. His notion of morality we have in his 
IX. Proposition where he makes the formal ratio of moral 
good and evil to consist in an agreement or disagreement 
with truth: and by truth, he immediately tells us, he means 
any truth whatever; any true proposition whatsoever, 
whether containing matter of speculation, or plain fact." '^^ 
I do not think it at all fair to say that this passage really 
gives the clearest statement of the ethical principle of 
Wollaston, for he is here concerned more with the question 
of the degrees of good and evil than with that of determin- 
ing the criterion of morality. The criterion is, of course, 
used in determining the degrees of good and evil; but since 
he is more concerned with the determination of the degrees 
than with stating the differentia of good and evil, he is not 
as careful in that regard as he is elsewhere. The thing in 
this passage, that makes Wollaston more open to criticism 
here than in any place else, is that he does apparently 
identify intellectual and moral relations. But, it must be 
remembered, that he has labored to make clear that there 
is not only truth of propositions but also truth of actions. 
His position is that all truth should be respected and that 
it is, to some extent, wrong to violate any truth. "I would 
have everything taken to be what in fact and truth it is." ^^ 
We are told by WoUaston's biographer that he had such a 

^« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 5. 

«" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 20. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 65 

passion for accuracy that he destroyed many manuscripts 
of his because he was not satisfied with them. A man can 
have a scientist's passion for truth, and at the same time 
grant that there is a great difference in the importance of 
purely academic speculative truth and that which more 
directly concerns human hapiness and human welfare. The 
thing that Wollaston is here insisting upon is that all truth 
should be respected and that it is wrong to violate any 
truth, however theoretical it may be in interest and in im- 
portance. It is of course far more important that he be 
true to human life and to truth directly concerned there- 
with. So instead of Wollaston giving up absolutely the 
distinction between truth and goodness, as Bott accuses 
him of doing, he really draws up a hierarchy of vices and 
virtues. By the principle of concomitant variation it may 
be shown that his moral criterion is that of truth to human 
happiness and welfare, for while all truth should be re- 
spected and while it is wrong to violate any truth there are 
degrees of good and evil. And the degree of good or evil 
is to be determined, not by its degree of conformability to 
abstract truth but by the importance of the truth conformed 
to or violated; and that which determines the importance 
of the truth is its relations to human life and to human 
happiness. ^^ 

Bott is insistent upon the point that in this passage is 
to be found Wollaston's "principal and peculiar notion of 
morality. And it is," he says, "visible on every page, how 
much he endeavors to carry this notion through the whole 
book, and make it agree to, or comprehend all virtues and 
vices whatsoever." He says that "as far as page 138 we 
find him proving T guilty of immorality, by taking from 
P something that was P's ; because by such an act, T de- 
clared that to be his own, and so acted a lie; in which, as 
he adds, consists the idea and formal ratio of moral evil. 
Indeed this is the peculiar notion of the book." ^^ It is 
very difficult to see how Bott can think that Wollaston con- 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 20 and 38-40. 
"Ibid., p. 138. Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Re- 
futed, p. 5. 



64 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

fuses ethical and logical relations in the case mentioned. He 
states that, according to Wollaston's principle, "T was 
guilty of immorality" because he treated P's property as 
if it were his own "and so acted a lie." To say that im- 
morality consists in acting a lie is no confusion of intel- 
lectual and moral relations. It is very clearly implied that 
the one belongs to the world of knowledge and the other 
to the realm of action. But Bott thinks that the two are 
hopelessly confused for he says: "I think his notion of 
moral good and evil make all truth not only moral, but 
equally so ; or, in other words, all truths are in themselves 
of equal importance, according to his definition; and the 
agreement or disagreement of our actions with them, equally 
moral or immoral." ^^ Bott certainly must have read the 
passage very carelessly for it states very clearly that 
"neither all evil nor all good actions are equal. Those 
truths which they respect, though they are equally true, 
may comprise matters of very different importance." ^* 
He makes it very clear also that he has in mind not formal 
truth but true life relations. As I have just said, Wollaston 
grants that all truths are moral, in some degree, in that 
truths of every kind should be respected; but it cannot be 
said that truths are considered by him to be of equal im- 
portance.^^ 

In spite of the fact that Wollaston makes it very clear 
that morality is concerned only with actions, Bott insists 
that he makes morality to depend upon the truth or falsity 
of some proposition. He goes further and says "if the 
moral goodness or evil of actions consists in their agree- 
ment or disagreement with truth," then "where there is this 
agreement or disagreement, there is moral good or evil, let 
the truth respected be what it will." ^^ This, as we have 
seen, Wollaston grants. Mathematical truths of an abso- 
lutely abstract nature should be respected, not alone be- 
cause of "the respect they bear to human beings" for mathe- 

^ Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 9. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 20. 

«« Ibid., p. 23. 

*' Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, pp. 8-9. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 65 

matical truths often come to have very close relations to 
human welfare, but also because "the least truth cannot be 
contradicted without much reluctance." ^^ Wollaston, how- 
ever, is very far from saying that it follows from this that, 
morally speaking, "whatever actions have an equal agree- 
ment or disagreement" with truth are "equally good or 
evil." ^^ In fact he denies this absolutely. He says, "that 
though to act against truth in any case is wrong, yet, the 
degrees of guilt vary with the importance of the things." 
In some cases the sin is great and in others it amounts to 
"almost nothing." Inanimate things, for example, Wollas- 
ton thinks, cannot be "considered as capable of wrong treat- 
ment, if the respect they bear to living beings is separated 
from them." ^^ 

Bott grants that "the author often speaks of truths of 
importance, or weight, etc., and so may be supposed to guard 
against any such objection as this." Bott thinks, however, 
that he fails to guard against the objection because he did 
not put any such word in "his definition of moral good and 
evil, and seems only incidentally to talk of the different im- 
portance of truths, when he is as it were forced to it by the 
cases that are put; and to which no tolerable answer could 
be given, without allowing such difference." ^^ In reply, I 
will say, that in the very passage that Bott is considering 
Wollaston does say that : "Every act . . . which interferes 
with truth ... is morally evil, in some degree or other." 
He also says that "neither all good, nor all evil actions are 
equal," because the "truths which they respect, though they 
are equally true, may comprise matters of very different 
importance." ^^ I grant that Wollaston does not, in this 
particular passage, state that it is the relation to human 
happiness and welfare that constitutes the standard by 
which the importance of a truth is determined, until he 
takes up particular cases. He does state in the proposi- 
tion itself that there are truths of very different impor- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 16 and 31. 

^ Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 9. 

*» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 31. 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 10. 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 20. 



66 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

tance, and, of course, this could only be a difference of 
importance for human lives, otherwise importance could 
have no moral connotation. Incidentally, it may be said, 
that Bott's criticism here is quite inconsistent with his other 
criticism of Wollaston, which is considered at length in the 
section on happiness, namely, that Wollaston makes the 
importance of truths to depend upon their relation to the 
production of human happiness. ^^ 

X 

In this paragraph Wollaston takes up at length the thesis 
stated in his introductory sentence. He there said: "The 
foundation of religion lies in that difference between the acts 
of men, which distinguish them into good, evil and indif- 
ferent." He thinks that he has proved that there is moral 
good and evil, consequently he affirms that there is Natural 
Religion. His position is somewhat different from that of 
Kant ; both rest religion on morality, but Kant bases moral- 
ity on a categorical imperative, an immediate and indubitable 
inner command, while Wollaston bases morality on the 
nature of things. I think that this objection might be made 
to the position of Wollaston on this point: Religion and 
morality are both rational and are demanded by the nature 
of things, so religion cannot be said to rest on morality. 
It is true that morality implicates religion, but religion just 
as truly implicates morality. They are in fact but the finite 
and the infinite aspects of one Weltauschauung, and this is 
really but Wollaston's way of relating them. By religion 
he means nothing else, he says, "but an obligation to do 
what ought not to be omitted, and to forbear what ought 
not to be done," which obligations are determined by the 
real natures of things due to their cosmic relations. Re- 
ligion "follows from the distinction between moral good 
and evil," which distinction is "founded in the respect which 
men's acts bear to truth." Truth can only be conformity 
to the real and ultimate natures of things, and since there 
are ultimate life relations based on the real nature of things 
»2 Bott, "Reli. of Nature Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 6. 



The Religion of Nature Delineated 67 

there is religion. This is natural religion based not on reve- 
lation but on the uninspired reason. Religion rests on the 
necessary distinction between good and evil, and this dis- 
tinction "is founded in the respect, which men's acts bear 
to truth." Truth, in turn, depends upon the real nature 
of things "since no proposition can be true, which expresses 
things otherwise, than as they are in nature." Both morality 
and religion are objective, their nature being determined by 
the real nature of things, by reality.^^ 

XI 

This paragraph epitomizes the argument of the entire 
section by stating the rationale of Natural Religion. The 
one great law of Natural Religion is : "That every intelli- 
gent, active, and free being should so behave himself, as by 
no act to contradict truth; or that he should treat every- 
thing as being what it is." ®* But this is also the law of 
morality. Natural Religion, then, teaches that man should 
be treated as being what he is and God as what he is. 

»» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. 
"* Ibid., p. 24. 



WOLLASTON'S CRITICAL INTERPRETATION 
OF OTHER SYSTEMS 

After stating his own view of Ethics Wollaston under- 
takes to offer a critical evaluation of the typical ethical 
theories. He says that "our main subject of study is the 
distinction between moral good and evil." The existence 
of any such distinction, he says, "some have been so wild 
as to deny." He thinks from what he has said already it 
is quite evident "that there is as certainly moral good and 
evil as there is true and false, and that there is as natural 
and immutable a difference "between the one as between the 
other." He then proceeds to pass judgment on the various 
ways of finding the differentia of moral good and evil.-'^ 

"They who place all in following nature, if they mean 
by that phrase acting according to the natures of things, 
or according to truth, say what is right. But this does 
not seem to be their meaning. And if it is only that a man 
must follow his own nature, since his nature is not purely 
rational, but there is a great part of him, which he has in 
common with the brutes, they appoint him a guide which 
I fear will mislead him, this being commonly more likely to 
prevail than the rational part. At best this is loose talk." ^ 
In the section on happiness this question of what is meant 
by a life conformable to nature is treated more completely. 
It is very clear, however, that he is not in agreement with 
those who interpret the formula "according to nature" 
hedonistically. If one means by a life "according to nature" 
a life lived conformably to the real and ultimate nature of 
things, or according to reason's dictates, then does Wollas- 
ton find himself in agreement, otherwise not. 

"They who make right reason to be the law, by which 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 22. 
* Ibid., p. 23. 

68 



WoUastcnCs Critical Interpretation of Systems 69 

our acts are to be judged, and according to their conform- 
ity to this or deflection from it call them lawful or unlawful, 
good or bad, say something more particular and precise,*' 
than do the hedonists. Wollaston says that they are right 
when they say that "whatever will bear to be tried by the 
test of right reason, is right; and that which is condemned 
by it wrong." He says that he agrees with them if by 
"right reason they mean that which is found by the right 
use of our rational faculties," but he says that he is not 
at all sure that this is what they mean.^ He is rather sure 
that this is not their meaning, but that they think that 
there is a special kind of reason which passes upon moral 
matters. He would not agree to the intuitional conception 
of the term "right reason," for when so conceived "each 
man has a different right reason, and each thinks that his 
alone is right." Wollaston says that there is only one kind 
of reason and by "right reason" one must, to be true to 
the facts, mean the "right use of our rational faculties." 
He does not think that man possesses a moral faculty but 
that moral matters are decided by the ordinary reason. He 
is very insistent upon the point that he will accept no 
intuitive notion of "right reason." He makes it very clear 
that there are two factors involved in the criterion of 
morality, the empirical and the rational, and also that 
"rational" is not given an intuitional but a ratiocinative 
connotation. He says: "And besides, what I have said, 
extends further; for we are not only to respect those truths, 
which we discover by reasoning, but even such matters of 
fact, as are fairly discovered to us by our senses. We 
ought to regard things as being what they are, which way 
soever we come to the knowledge of them." ^ As morality is 
"made to consist in the conformity of men^s acts to the 
truth of the case" we have a criterion which is "undeniable, 
intelligible and practicable." 

Wollaston takes the same attitude towards those who 
would make the criterion of morality a special sense or 
innate idea. You cannot, he says, "deduce the difference 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 
* Ibid., p. 23. 



70 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

between good and evil from the common sense of mankind, 
and certain principles born with us. . . . For it is much 
to be suspected there are no such innate maxims as they 
pretend, but that the impressions of education are mis- 
taken for them ; and besides that, the sentiments of man- 
kind are not so uniform and constant, as that we may safely 
thrust such an important distinction upon them." ^ So 
Wollaston very distinctly denies that he is an intuitionist 
or an intuitionalist. He believes neither in a special moral 
faculty nor in innate moral ideas nor in a moral sense, yet, 
as we shall see, critic after critic has identified his position 
with that of Intuitionism. 

It has been very common to identify the intellectualists 
and the intuitionalists in morals, and historically they have 
been associated together, because they have both been op- 
posed to the sensationalists. The two positions are really 
very different, and Wollaston is careful to deny the identity 
of his position and that of Intuitionalism. He says that 
one cannot know immediately and indubitably what he 
should do in any life situation, but that this can be known 
only after one has thought of the relations and meanings 
of things. It is true that the intellectualists presuppose 
a common rational nature, but the advantage of this over 
the idea of a moral faculty is that all human conduct can 
be evaluated by a common standard, that of inherent 
rationality. "The eternal rule of morality is that of right 
reason. This is the Law of Nature which is of universal 
extent, and everlasting duration." It is founded in the 
nature and reason of things, and is of the same original 
with the eternal reason of things. Its obligations "were 
from eternity, and the force of it reaches throughout the 
universe." To this "Law of Nature" the reason of all men 
everywhere naturally and necessarily assents.^ As con- 
trasted to the standard of rationalism the criterion of the 
intuitionist or intuitionalist is private, personal and peculiar, 
and be it ever so indubitable it is nevertheless unintelligible. 
The criterion of the intellectualists is that of truth, the 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. Clarke, Nat. Reli. IV. 5. 
• Ibid., p. 24. 



Wollaston^s Critical Interpretation of SysteTns 71 

principal of constancy in the meanings of all minds and 
the practical conformity in all living to these universal 
meanings. Perhaps the difference between the two views 
can be even more clearly drawn by simply characterizing 
the one as subjective and the other as objective. 

Wollaston ends this section of his treatment by criticizing 
the systems of Plato and Aristotle. The latter on the 
ground that the Golden Mean is often "difficult to discern," 
and also on the ground that "there are several obligations 
that can by no means be derived from it." With Plato he 
agrees that virtue "consists in such a likeness to God as we 
are capable of," but he criticizes Plato on the ground that 
he does not tell us "by what means we may attain this like- 
ness." He says that Plato's view must really be the same 
as his own for we must understand by living in "likeness 
to God" nothing other than "the practice of truth, God 
being truth, and doing nothing contrary to it." "^ 

Wollaston says that there are many other foundations 
upon which morality has been built, but says that he ques- 
tions whether any of them will hold any better than the ones 
he mentions. He is skeptical of all subjective principles 
and insists that the standard of morality must be an ob- 
jective one. He says: "But if the formal ratio of moral 
good and evil be made to consist in a conformity of men's 
acts to the truth of the case or the contrary, as I have here 
explained it, the distinction seems to be settled in a manner 
undeniable, intelligible, practicable. For as what is meant 
by a true proposition and matter of fact is perfectly under- 
stood by everybody; so will it be easy for any one, so far 
as he knows any true propositions and facts, to compare 
not only words but also actions with them." ^ He says that 
things themselves must be our standard, that we must con- 
stantly conforai our thoughts and lives to the real natures 
of things. Any system of morals is true to the extent that 
it is based on nature, understanding by nature the true 
nature and relations of things. 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. 
« Ibid., p. 24. 



WOLLASTON DEALS WITH POSSIBLE OBJEC- 
TIONS TO HIS PRINCIPLE 

Wollaston, before ending the section on "Moral Good and 
Evil," takes up certain objections that may be offered to 
his principle of determining moral relations. 

1. "If everything must be treated as being what it is" it 
naturally follows that "to treat my enemy as such is to kill 
him, or revenge myself soundly upon him." Not so, Wollas- 
ton answers, because my enemy is something more than my 
enemy, and I must consider him, not only as an enemy, but 
also as a human being who is due the treatment properly 
due a person. If all truth is to be observed my enemy must 
be treated not only as my enemy but also as a man and a 
citizen. I must, consequently, prosecute him in such a way 
as to be true to all these relations. It is quite evident that 
the taking of the law into my own hands would not do this." ^ 

2. "To use a creditor, who is a spendthrift, or one that 
knows not the use of money, or has no occasion for it, as 
such, is not to pay him." Wollaston answers this objection 
by saying that to act in such a way is to make oneself "the 
judge of his creditor, which is what he is not." To act in 
such a way would be to "arrogate to himself more than can 
be true," for he cannot know all the present and future 
circumstances of his creditor. Wollaston says that to pay 
a man what is due him does not deny "that he who pays 
may think him extravagant." The only significance the act 
of paying a debt to a spendthrift has, says Wollaston, is 
"that he w^ho pays thinks it due to the other." ^ John Clarke 
accused Wollaston of the fallacy of Begging the Question 
in his manner of dealing with this supposed objection. He 
says that Wollaston presupposes the idea of property, when 

1 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 25 and 27. 
' Ibid., pp. 25 and 28. 

72 



WoUaston Deals with Objections to His Principle 73 

he says that the debtor's act "directly denies the money 
which is the creditor's to be the creditor's." He says that 
Wollaston has no right to take for granted that which he 
designs to prove. "Since property is founded in the law 
of nature, ... to suppose property, is to suppose that 
there is a law of nature, the very thing in question, and 
which is the business and design of this section to prove." ^ 
Clarke grants that this is not an obvious petitio principii. 
It is not the same as saying the obvious thing that im- 
morality is a denial of the law of nature — or the religion of 
nature.* 

Bott undertakes to criticize WoUaston's answer by ask- 
ing "is it to be considered above all, or is it the principal 
circumstances in the debtor's guilt, that, by refusing to pay 
his debts, he denies that to be his creditor's, which really is 
his?" Bott denies that this is the case. He is insistent 
that immorality does not consist in such denials. The thing 
"to be considered above all, . . . when one man bastinadoes 
another to death," is not that by such an act "he denies 
him to be a man, or to have a sense of feelings ; or, in other 
words, asserts him to be a post." ^ I am very sure that 
Wollaston would agree entirely with the position taken by 
Bott, in another passage, that the immoral act implies the 
truth of the facts in the case and so cannot consist in a 
denial of the truth.^ Bott simply falls into the common 
mistake of failing to distinguish between the truth of acts 
and that of the propositions. One can act contrary to 
truth.^ 

3. In WoUaston's third instance, he asks, "If I want 
money do I not act according to truth, if I take it from 
somebody else to supply my wants?" Is that not treating 
my want as what it is and money as what it is? If I act in 
any other way "do I not act contrary to truth?" He an- 
swers saying: "Acting according to truth, as the phrase 
is used in the objection, is not the thing required by my 

» J. Clarke, Exam, of the "Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 31. 

*Ibid., p. 33. 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 16. 

• Ibid., p. 5. 

' Ibid., p. 7. 



74s The Ethics of William WoUaston 

rule; but, so to act that no truth may be denied by any 
act." ^ Bott intends to answer this objection but it is quite 
evident that he has it confused with one of Wollaston's 
illustrations. This case is concerned with the taking of 
money to satisfy my wants, whereas the other dealt with 
the case of giving to the poor. Bott evidently has the lat- 
ter in mind when he asks : "Who would have expected that 
such a man, as our author appears to be, should be capable 
of telling a poor wretch, just upon the point of starving, 
that if he cannot get relief in any honest way, he must take 
it as his fate. This, forsooth, because truth is truth; That 
is though, such a poor creature sees at his feet a penny loaf 
of his neighbor's, which his neighbor does not want, he must 
by no means touch it, because it is his neighbor's and not 
his own." ^ 

Bott thinks that Wollaston takes an extreme position in 
regard to the reverence he says men should have for the 
truth. I do not think that this is the case. Wollaston 
thinks that formal truth should be respected, but that there 
are occasions for such violations when it is necessary to 
the realization of a higher truth. Wollaston takes the posi- 
tion that there are almost always ways of supplying one's 
needs without the violation of truth. He says that "the 
man may by honest labor and industry seek to supply his 
wants ; or he may apply as a supplicant not as an enemy 
or robber, to such as can afford to relieve him." He does 
say that "if there is no way in the world, by which he may 
help himself without the violation of truth he must take it 
as his fate. Truth will be truth, and must retain its char- 
acter and force, let the case be what it will." ^^ I under- 
stand him to say that one should not do a criminal thing 
even in a critical situation. He does not say that no truth 
whatever should be violated even to further a higher truth 
as Bott accuses. ^^ Granting that Wollaston goes too far, 
in this case, I do not see that that constitutes an objection 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 25 and 27. 

• Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 17. 
"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 19 and 28. 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 8. 



Wollaston Deals with Objections to His Principle 76 

to his criterion of morality. There are occasions when truth 
should be violated for the sake of humanity, but this does 
not imply a principle other than that of truth. It only 
insists that there is higher and lower truth and that the lower 
should be sacrificed for the higher when they come into con- 
flict. In fact it is the idea of truth to humanity that makes 
Bott reject WoUaston's statement in this case. He is using 
the criterion of truth when he in effect insists that the all- 
important truth is that men must always be treated as men. 
Wollaston says that there are degrees of good and evil. He 
admits that truth concerning humanity is the all-important 
truth.i2 

4. "If one, who plainly appears to have a design of 
killing a man or doing him mischief, if he can find him, should 
ask me where he is, and I know where he is ; may not I, to 
save a life, say I do not know, though that be false?" Wol- 
laston says that this is a very unusual situation. He says 
that "It is certain . . . that nothing may willingly be done, 
which in any manner promotes murder" for to be "accessory" 
to murder "offends against many truths of great weight." 
It may be possible, however, to give an evasive answer or to 
give an answer verbally false. -^^ Bott criticizes Wollaston 
on the ground that he does not justify a lie in even such an 
extreme case as this. I do not understand Wollaston to take 
such an extreme position. True, he insists, that "truth is 
sacred," but he also says that a denial "by words" is not, as 
bad as to deny truth "by facts." He also says "all sins 
against truth are not equal, and certainly a little trespassing 
upon it in the present case, for the good of all parties," is to 
be justified.^* Bott thinks that Wollaston teaches that one 
should not tell a lie even to save a life because "truth is 
sacred." He asks "W^ould not one think that the man's life 
was much more sacred than such a truth as this? And who 
would not think that such a fellow, as should either by say- 
ing Yes, or by being silent, expose his neighbor to the knife 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 
"Ibid., p. 27. 

"Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 19. Wol- 
laston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 27. 



76 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

of a villain, greatly deserved, nothwithstanding all his 
scruples, an equal punishment with the ruffian himself." 
Bott thinks that Wollaston "contradicts himself, by his 
notable distinction between denying truth by words, and by 
facts, and making the latter much more criminal." ^^ I do 
not think that this is true for Wollaston simply means to 
say that all truth should be respected, and when one is 
forced by the exigencies of the situation to violate some 
truth, the violation of a merely verbal truth is less contra- 
dictory than the violation of truth by actions. Anyway, 
Bott's criticism on this point is very inconsistent, for he had 
criticized Wollaston on the score that he did not distinguish 
between formal truth and truth that involves human lives. 
He is, now, criticizing him on the ground that he does make 
that distinction, for that is really the essential difference, 
morally speaking, between denying truth by words and 
denying truth by facts. -^^ Wollaston says that all circum- 
stances should be considered and he says also that there are 
degrees of good and evil.^^ Bott is not able to properly 
appreciate Wollaston, due to the fact that he thinks that 
his system is based on an identification of the intellectual 
and the moral. This is made evident by this quotation: 
"For wherein is the guilt of a wicked deed? has it not been 
defined to lie in denying a truth? and is there not as much 
of this in a verbal falsehood? When therefore the same truth 
is equally affected both ways, sure the guilt is the same, or 
equal." ^^ 

5. Wollaston's last case is this : If a man in a frolic 
breaks a glass he uses it as that which it is not, and so his 
act is immoral. Does this not pay too much respect to an 
inanimate object? the supposed objector asks. Wollaston 
says that of course a drinking glass could not be considered 
as such, or to be what it is, if there were no men to drink 
out of them. To wantonly break a glass is wrong, because 
of the use to which a glass can be put and its consequent 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 20. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 
" Ibid., p. 23. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. DeUn., p. 15. Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." 
Considered and Refuted, p. 21. 



WoUaston Deals with Objections to His Principle 77 

value to men. So it is the relation to persons that consti- 
tutes the moral relation. Wollaston says that "all sins 
against truth are not equal," but must they not be accord- 
ing to the criterion of truth? He answers that "the degrees 
of truth vary with the importance of things." ^^ Again, he 
says, "inanimate beings cannot be considered capable of 
wrong treatment, if the respect they bear to living things 
is separated from them." Perhaps here as strongly as 
an3rwhere Wollaston states just what kind of relations con- 
stitute moral relations. He says, in effect, that those situ- 
ations are moral situations where human beings are involved. 
"When we compute what things are, we must take them as 
hieing what they are in reference to things that have life" 
and most of all to men.^^ 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 30. 
'° Ibid., p. 31. 



GENERAL INTERPRETATION OF SECTION I 

/. Morality Treated as Analogous to Truth 

In this section Wollaston undertakes to delineate the na- 
ture of goodness by comparing it with truth. I wish to 
prove that he did not identify goodness and truth, but that 
he merely compared the one with the other in order to ex- 
plicate the nature of goodness. The very use of the term 
"delineated" in the title of Wollaston's book is indicative 
of the analogous method which he employs. Reasoning by 
analogy was a favorite method in the Eighteenth Century. 
Religion and morality were both treated in that way by many 
writers. Wollaston took the position that the difference 
between good and bad is as immutable as that between true 
and false. He goes further and says that the difference is 
at bottom the same, but this does not mean that he identi- 
fies them. What he means is that both are in true confor- 
mity to things as they are, not that a moral act, or a value 
judgment, is an existential judgment, A is A, but that 
every one ought to treat A as A. He does not confuse the 
matter at all, for he makes good "to consist in a conformity 
of men's acts to the truth of the case, . . . evil the con- 
trary." ^ Wollaston thinks that the nature of truth is 
better understood than the nature of goodness, so tries 
to delineate goodness in terms of truth. 

Wollaston takes the position that acting according to the 
nature of things as the moral principle is as self-evident as 
the law of identity. This, Sidgwick says, leads Wollaston to 
state his four chief rules of righteousness, all of which are 
as self-evident as the general principle on which they depend. 
These four moral rules are: "Piety towards God, Equity 
and Benevolence towards our fellows, and Sobriety towards 
* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

78 



General Interpretation of Section I 79 

our own self." This does not mean that the relations must 
be always the same, but it does mean that when they are so 
and so a very definite moral obligation necessarily follows, 
and so morality is immutable. Sidgwick grants that Wollas- 
ton merely works out an analogy between goodness and 
truth, but still he says that the analogy is pressed so far 
that "the essential distinction between what is and what 
ought to be is lost." ^ It is very difficult to see how an 
analogy could be pressed so far as to confuse goodness and 
truth. The two could be confused only by failing to consider 
that the method used was that of analogy. 

Saying that moral relations are as true as logical relations 
is very far from the identification of the two, because while 
we cannot withhold our assent to speculative truth, "we can 
refuse to act up to a plain moral truth." ^ Selby-Bigge 
very properly suggests that Wollaston's meaning is that 
"practical truth is a metaphorical phrase and that the prac- 
tical absurdity of refusing to perform the appropriate act 
cannot be a formal fallacy." ^ Clarke had used this same 
method: "The reason which obliges every man in practice 
so to deal with another as he would expect that others 
should deal with him, is the very same as that forces him in 
speculation to affirm that if one line or number be equal to 
another, that other is reciprocally equal to it." ^ This can 
only mean that the same reason that pronounces material 
absurdity to be such, also pronounces moral absurdity to be 
such. It cannot mean that material absurdity can be a test 
of morality, but only an analogy of it. Hobbes had used 
this analogous argument for the obligation of justice. In- 
justice, he says, is as if a man should deny in the end what 
he had declared in the beginning.^ Williams very properly 
speaks of the relation of ethics to mathematics and logic as 
"an analogy and nothing more," and yet he goes on to say 
that the writers of this school allowed themselves to be mis- 



' Sidgwick, His. of Ethics, p. 183. 
"Clarke, Nat. Reli., 4:4. 
* Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, p. XXXI. 
•Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, 500. 
" Hobbes, Leviathan, ch. XIV. 



80 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

led by the analogy and so failed to make the distinction 
between what is and what ought to be.*^ 

Another proof that Wollaston did not confuse or identify 
goodness and truth, but only sought to explain goodness 
by taking the position that morality and immorality are 
analogous to truth and falsity in intellectual relations, is 
the fact that Clarke's method has been described as the 
method of analogy. There is no differ ence in the two mor- 
alists, in this respect, except that Clarke used the mathemati- 
cal analogy while Wollaston used the analogy of logic and 
physics. In the unsigned article in the Britannica on Clarke 
the statement is made that "His theory of fitness is formu- 
lated on the analogy of mathematics. He held that in rela- 
tion to the will things possess an objective fitness similar to 
the mutual consistency of things in the physical universe. 
This fitness God has given to actions, as He has given laws 
to nature ; and the fitness is as immutable as the laws." ^ 
The article states that Clarke's theory has been criticized 
on the ground that he "made virtue consist in conformity to 
the relations of things universally." In reply to these criti- 
cisms, it is said, that "the whole tenor of his argument shows 
him to have had in view conformity to such relations only as 
belong to the sphere of moral agency." The view is ex- 
pressed that Clarke might have escaped this criticism if he 
had emphasized more the relation of moral fitness to the 
will. I think that both Clarke and Wollaston did emphasize 
sufficiently the relation of the will to morality, in fact they 
made the difference between intellectual propositions and 
moral acts to depend upon this. Moral relations are like 
intellectual relations in the respect that both require con- 
formity to the objective nature of things, but moral actions 
are unlike intellectual judgments in that the former belong 
to the world of freedom while the latter belong to the world 
of description where relations are determined by the nature 
of things. The article, however, does say that it is a mis- 
take to say that "Clarke simply confused mathematics and 

'Williams, Art. Ethics in Britannica. 

' Anon., Art. Samuel Clarke in Britannica. 



General Interpretation of Section I 81 

morals by justifying the moral criterion on a mathematical 
basis. . . . He compared the two subjects on the basis of 
analogy." ^ 

Williams, in his article on ethics in connection with the 
exposition of the philosophy of Price, takes occasion to re- 
mark that Clarke and Wollaston confused the ethical ques- 
tion more than they explicated it by this use of the method 
of analogy. Price, he says, regards moral ideas as derived 
from the "intuition of truth or immediate discernment of 
the nature of things by the understanding." He regards 
"right" and "wrong" as "single ideas incapable of definition 
or analysis." Williams says that Price conceives the notions 
of "right," "fit," "ought" as coincident and by so doing 
"avoids." Williams thinks, "the confusion into which Clarke 
and Wollaston had been led by pressing the 'analogy be- 
tween ethical and physical truth !' " ^^ As I have already 
said I do not see how any confusion can result from pressing 
an analogy, a confusion can only result from forgetting that 
the relation between the good and the true is one of analogy. 
As we shall see, presently, many of Wollaston's critics fell 
into confusion in their interpretations of his system on this 
very point. 

This analogous method of treating morals has been very 
greatly misunderstood, and this misunderstanding has been 
largely due to the fact that Wollaston's critics have failed 
absolutely to consider that his method was that of analogy. 
Long ago Warlaw undertook to defend the principle of 
Wollaston, or rather he was determined to see that he was 
given a fair deal. Warlaw, as a matter of fact, dissents con- 
siderably from this principle on the ground that it is entirely 
too general, and also because he believes that Christian 
ethics is the only adequate system. Sir James Mackintosh, 
in criticizing the notion that a wicked act is as contradictory 
as a logical or mathematical contradiction, said that as it is 
impossible for 3 and 3 to be other than 6, it ought on this 
ethical principle, "to be impossible to do a wicked act," To 

•Anon., Art. Samuel Clarke in Britannica. 
"Williams, Art. Ethics in Britannica, vol. IX, p. 833, 



82 The Ethics of William WoUaston 



act without the proper regard to the nature of things, 
"as if a man were to use fire for cooling, or ice for heating" 
is absurd, but not immoral. Sir James goes on to say that 
the murderer who poisons conforms to the nature of things 
as much as does the physician who administers the emetic. 
All men, whether they mean to do good or ill, must conform 
to the nature of things. ^^ Warlaw answers, that when it is 
said that an immoral act is as absurd as to deny obvious 
logical or mathematical relations, the meaning, of course, 
is "that the two are equally absurd in their respective depart- 
ments, that the one is as preposterously contrary to the fit- 
ness of things, which constitutes the principles of morals, as 
the other is to those mathematical relations which constitute 
the principles of Geometry." He continues, "does not the 
very fact of his drawing a comparison, or borrowing an 
analogy, from the one to the other, show, that he considered 
the two descriptions of relations as essentially different, 
and moral relations, though capable of such analogical il- 
lustrations from logical or geometrical relations, as quite 
distinct from, and not in any way affected by them?" Pre- 
cisely the same is true of the physical relations like those re- 
ferred to by Sir James. Warlaw says : "The fact that the 
murderer and the physician act alike in conformity to such 
relations for their respective ends, is so far from bringing 
their respective actions in identity, or even alliance with 
each other, that illustration of the position could have been 
made as easily from physical as from mathematical or logi- 
cal relations. One could say that the act of murder is as 
absurd a thing in the department of morals, as, in the de- 
partment of physics, would be the 'choosing of fire for cool- 
ing or ice for heating'." ^^ Warlaw says that, of course, 
^'morality is not founded on relations universally and of 
every sort, but only on those capable of such application, 
relations involving persons." No one, he says, could imagine 
morality to attach to purely abstract things. Mackintosh 
had said that "it seems evident, that no relations are to be 

" Mackintosh, Preliminary Dissertation. 

"Warlaw, Christian Ethics, p. 303. Mackintosh, Preliminary Disser- 
tation. WoUaston, Reli. of Nature Deli., p. 15. 



General Interpretation of Section I 83 

considered, except those in which a living, intelligent and 
voluntary agent is one of the beings related." This Warlaw 
says is precisely the teachings of Wollaston, "it never oc- 
curred to me, before reading Mackintosh, that this moral 
principle had any reference to mathematical or logical ab- 
stractions." The system teaches that there ought to be a 
conformity of actions to the nature of things, Warlaw 
says, but not that morality consists in "relations which are 
entirely extraneous to the department of moral agency, but 
all the relations in which such agency is possible. On these 
universally the general system of morals rests, and in con- 
formity to these universally, virtue consists." Wollaston 
anticipated just such objections as those offered by Sir 
James Mackintosh, and his answers were very similar to 
those offered by Warlaw.-^^ 

Some of the moralists who interpret WoUaston's system 
idealistically see in his analogical method a profound meta- 
physical significance. It is said that such an analogy be- 
tween the good and the true can be found only because of the 
ultimate coincidence of the two.-^* I think that this is true 
but we do not want to interpret this in such a way as to make 
Wollaston confuse logical and moral relations. Windel- 
band says that "Wollaston determined the content of the 
moral law solely by metaphysical relations, and, accordingly, 
in the last instance, by logical criteria." He sought to find 
"an objective principle of morals in the general suitableness 
of an action to its determining relations," and "claimed for 
this knowledge a self-evidence analogous to that of logical 
relations." He though also, says Windelband, that the 
feeling of obligation which determines the will to appropri- 
ate action "comes from the insight as to natures and rela- 
tions." -^^ This same metaphysical interpretation of the 
method of analogy is implied in what Blakey has to say of 
it. He says that a great part of the reasoning on the eter- 
nal nature of virtue is grounded upon "a principle of 
analogy, which Clarke and Wollaston said existed between 

"Warlaw, Christian Ethics, pp. 303-5. 

" Von Hartmann, Phanomenologie des Sittlichen Bewusstseins, p. 347. 

" Windelband, His. of Phil., p. 504. 



84 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

our perceptions of good and evil and our mental perceptions 
of figure and quality. Iniquity is the very same in action, as 
contradiction is in theory." ^^ Perhaps this metaphysical 
interpretation is even more pronounced in Grote than in any 
of the moralists who so interpret Wollaston. In his chap- 
ter "on the analogy between the intellectual and the moral 
ideals," he says, that "man is social to the bottom of his 
mind." It is for this reason, according to Grote, that when 
a man thinks, he thinks generally. When we think, we think 
not for our own intelligence alone, but for general intelli- 
gence, and we verify our thoughts accordingly. Grote, then, 
discusses the applicability of truth to action, showing the 
close connection of our active and intellectual natures. The 
two historic ideals of morality, that of rightness and that 
of good, are he says, analogous and also historically closely 
related to the ideals of truth, empiricism and rationalism. 
The one view of knowledge is that things just impress them- 
selves on us as they are. The other view is that we think of 
things as we should. The term analogy is not quite strong 
enough, thinks Grote, to express the relation between the 
intellectual and the moral. "True," he says, "the intellectual 
suggests the moral," but "the rightness which governs ac- 
tions is an extension or wider application of the truth which 
governs thought." Moral action is as rational, he says, as 
is intellectual truth, "because as conformable to the nature 
of things." This is practically a quotation from Wollaston, 
consequently it is very clear that Grote is discussing him 
although he mentions neither Clarke nor Wollaston by 
name. He has them in mind, of course, when he says that 
"many philosophers, whom we may call the intellectual mor- 
alists, have followed out this view extensively." The relation 
of the good to the intellectual ideal of real being was, he. 
says, worked out by Plato in a very beautiful way. The 
relation of rightness to truth was, he says, worked out in 
very much the same way by the intellectual moralists.^^ 

" Blakey, His. of Moral Sc, p. 212. 

" Grote, A Treatise on Moral Ideals, pp. 60-7. 



General Interpretation of Section I 85 

//. The Search for an Objective Standard of Morality 

The agreement between the world order and man's reason 
is the ground of moral obligation. It is essential to reason 
to respect order, as soon as the idea of it is conceived. This 
is what is meant by the objectivity of morality. It is entirely 
consistent, then, to say that the reason is the moral faculty, 
and at the same time say that the nature of morality is de- 
termined by the objective nature of things. It must be 
understood, however, that by reason we do not mean intuition 
or innate idea, but rather the interpretative power of the 
mind. At first sight, it would appear as if there were two 
very different criteria of morals in Wollaston's system, 
namely, the rationalistic principle which should guide one 
in all his acts, and the objective principle, conformity to the 
nature of things, which must characterize every action that 
is denominated moral. The two are, however, for him, en- 
tirely reconcilable, in that rational actions are precisely 
those actions which are in conformity to the nature of 
things, and, apart from such objective reference, one cannot 
say that anything is either rational or irrational. Apart 
from relations one cannot say that anything is true or false, 
good or bad. Both our theory of knowledge and our theory 
of morals must rest on an objective basis. 

The law of identity constitutes the one ethical law for 
WoUaston. True, a judgment expressing identity, A is 
A, is an existential judgment, merely, and it expresses an 
ought and becomes a moral judgment, only when it is ap- 
propriated by a person. Its identity may then be affirmed 
or denied by deeds. Man belongs to two worlds, is and ought, 
but, after all, ought is just acting in accordance with the 
rationality of things. When, duly considered, the value 
judgment is just an existential judgment of a higher and 
more ultimate nature. As to the validity of this principle, 
who can question the position that a man ought always to 
act in such a way as to fulfill his rational nature, which can 
be done only by living conformably to the real nature of 
things.? It is reason which differentiates man from the rest 



86 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

of the animal kingdom. The true life of man must, then, be 
a rational life. A rational life is, on the one hand, a life 
guided by self-knowledge, self-reverence and self-control; 
but, on the other hand, it is a life, all acts of which must be 
characterized by self-consistency and coherency, — in a word, 
a life conformable to the objective nature of things. This 
means that the good life is a life lived in accordance with the 
logical laws of identity and contradiction. This means that 
no action should deny essential relations and natures, or 
stated positively, that everything should be treated in ac- 
cordance with its nature and relations. Wrong denies the 
indissoluble unity of life and the world, and is therefore 
self-contradictory. Good affirms this indissoluble unity of 
life and the world, and is therefore self-consistent and co- 
herent. The finite fragmentary self realizes itself only by 
coming to think of itself as a significant member of this unity 
of life and the world, and the moral choices of such a life are 
determined by this realization of the indissoluble unity of the 
individual life with the entire cosmic order. Everything in 
the world gets its value and significance from its relations 
to other things. It is an infinitely related system, and mor- 
ality consists in the affirmations of these in thought and deed, 
whenever and wherever human lives are involved. Man being 
free he can either affirm or deny these essential life rela- 
tions by his actions, and it is this freedom which constitutes 
him a moral being. 

This type of philosophizing came as a natural reaction to 
the relativity of empiricism and hedonism. Morality, it was 
felt, should possess universality and necessity in order to 
have validity and authority. Professor Seth says that a 
subjective basis failed to satisfy these conditions, so the 
intellectualists made the appeal not to any moral sense or 
moral faculty which is subjective and relative, but to the 
moral reason which is universal. ^^ Wollaston realized that 
both the subjective moral principles of interest, and of intui- 
tion are insufficient, and that an objective and logical prin- 
ciple is necessary. In order to make morality objective he 
tried to place it upon an intellectual basis. After criti- 

" Seth, Ethical Principles, p. 173. 



General Interpretation of Section I 87 

cizing the extreme intellectualism of the system, Vorlander 
grants that there is "a certain justification for this because 
it represents a reaction from systems of ethics which based 
morahty upon subjective feehngs and inclinations" and 
which paid httle attention to the relation of the subject to 
things and to persons. ^^ Von Hartmann says that Wollas- 
ton's attempt to carry out a pure rationalism in the realms 
of morality is most noteworthy. "For he has seized with 
philosophical daring and carried out with admirable acumen 
the standpoint to which abstract rationalism of conscious 
reflection must come." He says that "consistent rationalism 
is bound to acknowledge the consistency of this position." ^^ 
Garve says that Clarke and Wollaston and the German 
Kant must be considered as the inventors of a new moral 
principle based completely on the reason. Garve is right 
when he says that while Kant distinguished sharply between 
the practical and the theoretical reason, Clarke and Wollas- 
ton made no such distinction. Morality is based on a purely 
rational principle and this is not conceived as a peculiar 
kind of reason. Garve says that Clarke and Wollaston think 
of morality "as a practice of reason," but rightly says 
that this is very different from Kant's "practical reason" 
or moral intuition.^-*^ Garve understands this system of 
morals to be based on the pure reason and so on the nature 
of things learned by experience. Erdmann's interpretation 
is the same. He understands Wollaston to teach the objec- 
tivity of morals. "What determines how they must be treated 
are not a priori laws in one's reason," and since "there are 
no such common principles given (da es keine solche all- 
gemeine Vernunftprincipien geben) a priori to the human 
mind men must think out on the basis of experience and 
reason how they shall act." So, he says, that Wollaston 
teaches "dass grosse Gesetz der Religion, oder der Natur ist, 
dass die Dinge als das behandelt werden, was sie sind." It 
follows from this "that not an inner imperative but the na- 
ture of things determine the action and its worth." ^^ Win- 

" Vorlander, Geschichter der Philosophiscen Moral, etc., p. 386. 
^" Von Hartmann, Phanomenologie des Sittlichen, etc., p. 345. 
^ Garve, Uebersicht der vornehmsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 167. 
^ Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Philosophic, vol. II, p. 116. 



88 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

delband says that Wollaston sought to find "an objective 
principle of morals in the general suitableness of an action to 
its determining relations." ^^ Vorlander interprets him as 
finding the criterion in the objective; "Diejenige Handlung 
is gut, welche der Natur des Gegenstandes angemessen 
ist." 24 

In a system of ethics that is both rational and objective, 
morality consists in the suitableness of the action to the na- 
ture and relations of the object, and that, in the last analysis, 
it is coincident with truth. This dual principle is clearly 
shown in Vorlander exposition of Wollaston's principle; 
"The great commandment of Natural Religion or the great 
moral principle is that every intelligent, acting and free 
being shall thus act, that it does not contradict truth through 
any action or that it treats everything according to what 
it is." Vorlander thinks that this is not really a dual prin- 
ciple because to act rationally, "dass es durch keine Thatig- 
keit einer Wahrheit widerspricht" means precisely "dass es 
jedes Ding als das was es ist behandelt." ^^ Falckenberg un- 
derstands Wollaston in the same way as Vorlander: "That 
action is good whose execution includes the affirmation of a 
truth or whose omission the negation of a truth." Accord- 
ing to the law of nature, a rational being ought so to con- 
duct himself that he shall never contradict a truth by his 
actions, i. e., to treat each thing for what it is." ^^ The 
highest destination of man is, on the one hand, to know the 
truth, and, on the other, to express it in actions. This does 
not mean that there is any naked truth, for all truth is con- 
cerned with things and relations. Hall says that Wollaston 
"has an interesting discussion of moral good as essentially a 
correspondence with the facts of the universe. . . . Truth is 
the good because it corresponds to God's nature, and all hu- 
man acts are statements affirming or denying in various de- 
grees God's eternal truth." He quotes a passage from Wol- 
laston which he thinks states his position: "Every intelli- 

23 Windelband, His. of Phil., p. 504. 

^ Vorlander, Gesch. der Philosophischen Moral, &c., p. 385. 
*5Ibid., p. 385. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 
=» Falckenberg, His. of Modern Phi., p. 196. 



General Interpretation of Section I 89 

gent, active and free being should so behave himself as by 
no act to contradict truth, or that he should so treat every- 
thing as being what it is." ^^ 

Windelband says that the philosophical element in the 
system of Wollaston "is the striving after an objective basis 
of morahty." He says that Wollaston "based" morality 
"on the nature of things themselves," and to this he also 
"gave a logical turn. He viewed the matter from the stand- 
point that there is involved in every moral action a theoreti- 
cal proposition and therewith a judgment as to the things 
treated or of the prevailing circumstances.^® He thinks that 
Wollaston fails to distinguish clearly between the intellectual 
and the moral, and yet he says that "of course he also pointed 
out that a person must differentiate from this judgment not 
only the action but the decisions as to the same." Windel- 
band says one finds in this philosophy a careful investigation 
of "the difference between will and an affirmative judgment." 
But even after he has said this he goes right on and makes 
a statement that makes it quite evident that he does not 
really get the significance of the will in WoUaston's system: 
"Now, although Wollaston thought of the action as different 
from the judgment, he nevertheless meant that the worth of 
the action stands or falls with the worth of the judgment, 
and consequently he found the moral criterion in that this 
judgment was either true or false." I think that Windel- 
band is wrong in saying that with Wollaston "das der Werth 
der Handlung mit dem Werthe dieses Urtheils stehe und 
falle." It is not true that a moral action is one that truly 
recognizes "the object or relation to which the action refers," 
for a wrong action as truly as a right action recognizes the 
truth of the case, but rather is the moral action one that is 
conformable to the recognized truth. According to Wol- 
laston an evil action also recognizes the truth of the nature 
and relations of things and the act could not be morally 
wrong otherwise.^^ 

" Hall, His. of Christian Ethics, p. 453. 
28 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 

» Windelband, Gesch. der Neurn Philosophie, vol. II, pp. 266-7. Wol- 
laston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 7-8. 



90 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

Wundt says that according to Wollaston^s principle, 
moral norms possess an objective reality equal to that of 
mathematical or physical laws, "so that a transgression of 
law in the moral realm is like a change in the proportion of 
bodies which breaks the laws of nature in the physical 
world. As truth consists in the agreement of our ideas with 
the nature of things, so good consists in the agreement of 
our acts with things. . . . To act according to nature is, 
in Wollaston's opinion, to act morally and in obedience to 
God." He was perhaps influenced by the natural philosophy 
of Newton, Wundt thinks, in thus regarding morality "in 
the light of a violation of the laws of nature." While Wundt 
thinks this to be a defect, still, he says, "this attempt to 
prove the objectivity of morals, as against the subjectivity 
of current views of morals, was historically important." ^^ 

Stewart says that Wollaston tried to reconcile Locke's 
theory of the origin of ideas with the immutability of mora] 
distinctions by taking the position that virtue consists in 
conduct conformable to truth. He said that right and wrong 
cannot be just simple ideas, as the intuitionalists taught, 
"but that morality must be conformity with relations per- 
ceived by the reason." ^^ In discussing the historical origin 
of Wollaston's objective principle of morality, Erdmann has 
this to say: "Locke placed both speculative and practical 
principles in the same class, taking the position that neither 
are innate. He went further, however, and made the posi- 
tive statement that the speculative principles are presented 
to the mind by the external world." Now, says Erdmann, 
Wollaston took the same positive position in regard to 
practical principles : "The mind cannot draw the principles 
of action from within itself, they must come to it from 
without." He says that " the moral law," for Wollaston, 
"is summed up in the formula: We should follow nature, 
or treat everything as that which it is. . . . In our actions 
we should act as things prescribe." ^^ 

"For a man to act virtuously," according to Blakey's un- 

3» Wundt, Ethics, p. 66. 

^ Stewart, Works, vol. VI, p. 290. 

''^Erdmann, His. of Phil., vol. II, pp. 116-20. 



General Interpretation of Section I 91 

derstanding of Wollaston, "he must square his conduct ac- 
cording to the truth of things ; or to treat everything ac- 
cording to its real character, or as it really is." He be- 
lieved in the stability of the laws of nature, says Bailey, 
and that everything in the world is regulated by infinite wis- 
dom. His system of ethics is "grounded on a simple meta- 
physical principle that truth in everything is to be in con- 
formity with the constituted order of nature." ^^ Bain says : 
"With him, a bad action contains the denial of a true propo- 
sition. . . . Truth can be denied by actions as well as by 
words. Thus the violation of a contract is the denial by 
action that the contract has been concluded. . . . Robbing 
a traveler is the denial that what you take from him is his. 
. . . An action that denies one or more true propositions 
cannot be good, and is necessarily bad. A good action is 
one whose omission would be bad or whose contrary is bad, 
in the above sense." ^* 

There is in the system of Wollaston an a priori element, 
namely, that one can know as a universal and necessary first 
principle of morality that an intelligent being should always 
act rationally. This is, however, entirely reconcilable with 
the demand that morality be objective, because acting ra- 
tionally means acting in conformity to the nature of things. 
Wollaston insists that, apart from such objective reference, 
we cannot say that any action is either rational or irrational. 
It follows, of course, that, apart from such objective refer- 
ence, no action can be pronounced either good or bad. He 
would not admit that an action can be called good, simply 
because the will or the intention is good, but the objectivity 
of his principle demands that there be some anticipatory 
consideration of consequences. As Von Hartmann says, 
though, there is a tendency for one who has accepted the 
principle that morality must be based on reason to "make 
the immediate basis of morality that theoretical rationality 
with which he is best acquainted" and to "proclaim truth 
as the principle of morality." ^^ There is no truth that has 

^Blakey, His. of Moral Sc, p. 152. Briley, His. of Phil., vol. Ill, 
pp. 7 and 8. 

^ Bain, Moral Sc, p. 152. 

** Von Hartmann, Phanomenologie des Sittl. Bewusstseins, p. 343. 



92 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

not an objective reference for there can be no reality to 
knowledge that is not a knowledge of reality; consequently, 
when morality is based on truth it is based on the nature of 
things, not on intuition, — truths independent of objective 
reference, for there are no such truths. Erdmann very truly 
says that only those propositions are true, "which define 
things as they actually are (welche die Dinge so setzen, wie 
sie wicklich sind), or truth is the conformity of symbols 
or names with the things themselves." Erdmann says that 
Wollaston first gives his principle as if it were a purely for- 
mal one, but later explains it "more definitely to the effect 
that that action is good which is in accord with the nature 
of the object (die Handlung gut ist, welche der Natur des 
Gegenstandes gemass ist)." ^^ 

Wollaston's assertion that truth constitutes the moral 
principle, together with his view that ethics must have an 
objective basis asserts, or at least implies, an idealistic view 
of the world, because these two things could both be true, 
consistent and coherent, only if they both belonged to a 
world of meaning, a coherent world order.^^ Perhaps 
Clarke brings out these broader relations somewhat more 
clearly, in some respects, than does Wollaston. It is in the 
nature of things, that is, in the nature of reality and man, 
says Clarke, that moral distinctions are founded. The in- 
dividual soul stands to the rest of nature in the relation of 
subject and object, the perceiving mind and the things 
perceived. The universe is reasonable and the same reason 
which pervades the whole, exists also in each individual. He 
does not mean that this exists as a divine implantation, for 
he goes on to say that the reason in man perceives reason 
elsewhere. "If a natural or a fitting thing exists it will be 
perceived by the individual mind." Rationality demands 
conformity not only in thought, but also in life to "the 
absolute reason of things." ^^ 

Schmidt says that Wollaston's norm of conduct lies not 
within, but in things, "to whose true nature our deeds and 

''Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Philosophic, vol. II, pp. 113-4. 

»^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 7-8 and 19. 

8" Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 43. Wollaston, Reli, of Nat., etc., p. 23, 



General Interpretation of Section I 93 

words must simply conform." This does not mean, says 
Schmidt, that WoUaston^ thought morality consisted in 
acting conformably to things viewed singly, but each thing 
is to be thought of "in connection with the others, in its 
relations to all others." This is one of the best interpreta- 
tions of Wollaston. It implies that this objective order has 
a metaphysical meaning, and I am very sure that Wollaston 
understands it that way. Wollaston speaks of an immoral 
action as opposing the will of the Author of nature and as 
contradicting nature and truth. These untrue and unnat- 
ural things are wrong, he says, because they "break through 
the constitution of things." ^^ Gass gives Wollaston's prin- 
ciple of conformity to nature a similar metaphysical in- 
terpretation. In a rational system of morality, like that of 
Wollaston, Gass says "that every will must be determined by 
a universal purpose as well as by the nature of the individual 
case (dass jeder Wille durch eine allgemine Zweckmassig- 
keit sowie anderseits durch die Bes chaff enheit des eigelnen. 
Falles bestimmt werde)." Gass says that the "appropri- 
ateness of acting conformably to the nature of things 
strongly "recommends itself through itself. It makes the 
impression of the fitting by which disorder and extravagance 
are excluded and through its rule it guarantees also happi- 
ness." *^ Gass understands Wollaston to mean that it is 
inherently rational to act conformably to the nature of 
things. He also understands him to say that the experiences 
of life justify the belief in the rationality of the criterion. 

Wollaston is considered by Morell to belong to the move- 
ment characterized by him as English Polemical Idealism. 
He says that in England Idealism has always appeared as 
an opposition movement. The English mind is of a practi- 
cal bent and not naturally inclined to speculation, conse- 
quently in England "the rationalistic method of philoso- 
phizing has seldom been carried to any great extent, except 
it has been occasioned and almost necessitated by the ex- 

^ Schmidt, Das Gewissen, p. 296. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., 
p. 38. 

*" Gass, Gesch. der Christlichen Ethik, p. 19. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., pp. 8, 11, 15, 38 and 52. 



94 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

cesses of the opposite school." Wollaston, he says, must 
be regarded as the opponent of extreme empiricism. "The 
ground he takes in his ethical system, namely, that virtue 
consists in acting according to the truth of things, is a 
sufficient proof that he regarded some conception as abso- 
lutely necessary, and originating in the very constitution 
of man's rational nature." Since Morell says that this abso- 
lutely necessary conception of morality is, that "virtue con- 
sists in acting according to the truth of things," he cannot 
mean by "originating in the very constitution of man's 
rational nature," that morality is based on innate ideas. 
He says explicity that experience is involved in moral knowl- 
edge. Idealism is involved, Morell thinks, in Wollaston's 
thought that there are certain fixed relations in the universe, 
cognizable by the human reason, and that virtue consists 
in acting conformably thereto. ^^ 

The idealistic interpretation of Wollaston's ethical sys- 
tem is perhaps shown more clearly by Victor Catherein than 
by any other commentator. We are, according to Catherein 
to treat everything according to its own nature, but also 
"nach seinem Verhaltniss zu uns und zum Weltganzen." He 
thinks that a thing cannot be treated according to its na- 
ture, or treated as what it is, without a due consideration 
of "its relations to us and to the entire universe." This 
is true because a thing is really nothing apart from its con- 
nections with other things. Without such relations it cer- 
tainly could have no ethical significance, "denn alle Dinge 
seien so eingerichtet, das sie zusammen ein harmonisches 
Weltganze bildeten." *^ 

« Morell, His. of Modern Phil., p. 137. 
*^ Catherein, Moralphilosophie, p. 215. 



WOLLASTON AND HIS CRITICS 

I wish to consider in this division of my treatise the gen- 
eral criticisms that have been made of Wollaston's intellec- 
tual system of Ethics. Specific criticisms of specific por- 
tions of his work are treated in the appropriate place. I 
think that an extensive consideration of Wollaston's critics 
is justified on the ground that the very raison d'etre of 
writing the thesis is to show that WoUaston has been a very 
much abused man, and especially to show that he was not 
guilty of holding the nonsensical views he has been supposed 
to hold. I will now take up in a systematic way the criti- 
cisms that have been made to his system. 

I. Criticism 

THAT HE CONFUSES LOGICAL AND MORAL RELATIONS 

The criticism that has been most frequently offered to 
WoUaston is that he confuses logical and moral relations. 
This has been so from the beginning. John Clarke, a con- 
temporary of WoUaston, makes this criticism of his cri- 
terion of morality. In regard to the contention of WoUas- 
ton "that men may by their actions or omissions deny truth," 
John Clarke says, that the only meaning this can have is 
that "actions . . . are expressive ... of propositions," 
that they are ways "of conveying sense ... to the minds of 
others." -^ This is, of course, just the common confusion 
due to the failure to understand that W^oUaston speaks of 
actions which express merely intellectual meaning, actions 
of the pantomime and gesture variety; and also of actions 
expressive of character, moral actions. This confusion is 
made evident by what fellows. Clarke says that all that 
WoUaston can mean is that an action may convey a false 
* J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Moral Good, p. 20. 

95 



96 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

impression **even where a person has no intention by his ac- 
tion of conveying any such sense to the mind of others." 
WoUaston says that in such cases 'moral good and evil is 
not imputable." ^ 

I have already considered several of the specific criticisms 
made of particular portions of the work of Wollaston by 
his contemporary, Bott. While his criticism is confined al- 
most exclusively to Proposition IX, it has a general appli- 
cation also, because he thinks that in this proposition Wol- 
laston states his "principal notion" of morality. Bott 
thinks that Wollaston fails to give a real differentia of mor- 
ality. He says even after the idea of importance is added 
to that of truth, it 'is still inadequate as a moral criterion, 
for "those acts in which there is an equal agreement or dis- 
agreement, will be, in an equality, morally good or evil." ^ 
He thinks that this will not hold, for if it did then two mor- 
ally contradictory acts would be equally moral, which is 
impossible. He states a case like this. Two men A and C 
both meet a poor wretch, B, at the point of starvation. A 
"takes notice of his case, says everything that is right about 
it, and goes his way. C comes immediately after, sees what 
B's case is, gives him relief and departs. Here A's words 
and C's actions are supposed perfectly to agree with B^s 
circumstances ; that is, in the language of our author, they 
each of them say, B's case is really what it is: and there- 
fore, according to him, because the agreement is equal, the 
moral goodness of their acts must be equal too. But is this 
true? Nay, is it true, even though we should suppose, that 
A really had it not in his power to do more? It won't im- 
mediately follow, that his act was morally as good as C's. 
Again, D meets the wretch B, and denies his case to be what 
it is, and calls him a cheat, though he knows to the con- 
trary. E meets with him, and beats him to any degree. It 
will be impossible not to find both these persons equally 
moral, according to our author; yet certainly they are not 
so." * This confusion has been dealt with, at length, else- 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 

•Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 11. 

* Ibid., pp. 11-12, 



Wollaston and His Critics 97 

where, but I will say that it rests upon a failure to distin- 
guish between the two ways in which truth can be affirmed or 
denied. Wollaston says, "A true proposition may be denied 
or things may be denied to be what they are, by deeds, as 
well as by express words. It is certain there is a meaning 
in many acts and gestures. . . . But these do not come up 
to my meaning. There are many acts of other kinds, such 
as constitute the character of a man's conduct in life." ^ 

Bott, then, proceeds to state another case where there is 
precisely the same confusion between intellectual truth and 
morality. "If P says T's horse is his, when really he is not, 
he is as guilty as if he actually stole him. For the dis- 
agreement in both these instances of P's actions with the 
truth of the case, is equal. In short, for anything there is 
in our author's definition, there is no difference betwixt a 
man's talking to a post, as if he were a man, and beating 
him as though he were a post." ^ Wollaston practically an- 
ticipates this criticism in his case of a man stealing a horse 
and riding away upon him. He may, Wollaston grants, 
conform to some truth by so acting, for he is treating the 
horse as a horse. He is, however, acting in violation of 
other truths.^ The mere assertion by P that T's horse is 
his, Wollaston says, violates very little truth compared to 
actually stealing a horse.* Wollaston says that talking to 
a post is not so wrong as it is absurd, because the nature 
of personality is not greatly violated and that is the all-im- 
portant truth. ^ 

Bott says that "the author has put into his definition a 
qualifying word or two, in order to escape the objection of 
his making all morally evil acts . . . and all good ones, 
equal. He brings in, Bott says, the phrase "in some degree 
or other," because there can, of course, be no "equality of 
all evil or all good actions." ^^ Wollaston goes further, 
says Bott, and makes the qualifying statement that "those 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

"Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 12. 

' Ibid., p. 12. 

» Ibid., p. 19. 

"Ibid., p. 20. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. DeUn., pp. 20-1. 



98 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

truths which they respect, though they are equally true, may 
comprise matters of very different importance; or more 
truths may be violated one way than another." ^^ Bott 
thinks that in bringing in these qualifying terms Wollaston 
really gives up the criterion of conformity to truth. With 
this criterion, Bott says, that "the difference of actions can- 
not depend upon the different importance of the truths 
respected by them," because any "good action asserts a 
thing to be what it is, . . . so it is impossible that any other 
good action . . . should do more with reference to the 
truth respected by it." ^^ Bott does not make good his 
criticism because he has no reason for his insistence that 
either morally or scientifically considered truths are of equal 
importance. Truths are equally true but they are not 
equally important. He implies that there is some flaw in the 
argument that a thing must be considered in all respects but 
he offers no refutation of it.-^^ An action may conform to a 
truth and at the same time violate a thousand truths far 
more significant. Every immoral act conforms to some 
truths, but it is, nevertheless, essentially untrue and cannot 
be made to fit into a coherent world order. Such a state- 
ment does not involve the denial of the criterion of truth, 
as Bott supposes.-^* The same kind of objection could be 
made against any criterion of morality. 

Vorlander understands Wollaston to say that "every bad 
action is a lie ( jede schlechte Handlung ist eine Liige) ; to 
violate an agreement means actually to deny it. A wrong 
is so much greater the more true propositions it denies ; the 
good act must then be in accord with all relations of the 
object." ^^ If we had only the last statement we would 
think that Vorlander understood Wollaston, but a wrong 
deed does not deny true propositions. He only teaches that 
a wrong deed is as false to world and life relations as is the 
denial of a true proposition. It is wrong precisely because 
it is based on assent to theoretical truth and is inconsistent 

" Bott, "Reli. of Nat. Delin." Considered and Refuted, p. 13. 

" Ibid., p. 14. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 

"Ibid., p. 15. 

"Vorlander, Gesch. der Philosophischen Moral, etc., p. 385. 



Wollaston and His Critics 99 

therewith. Wundt has a somewhat better understanding of 
Wollaston, but he thinks that Wollaston confuses intellectual 
and moral relations. He takes the position that Wollaston 
considered moral wrong and intellectual error as equally 
contradictory "riickt das sittliche Vergehen auf gleiche 
Linie mit intellectuellem Irrthum." ^^ Moral wrong and in- 
tellectual error are equally contradictory, because they are 
equally inconsistent with the true nature of things. Wollas- 
ton insists that this is so, but he does not confuse the two 
very different kinds of things, — immoral acts and intellectu- 
ally erroneous judgments. ^^ Hume says that error is not 
sin as he understands Wollaston to believe. There is no 
immorality, Hume says, in merely making an erroneous 
judgment, but "if moral distinctions be derived from the 
truth or falsehood of these judgments, they must take place 
whenever we form the judgment." ^^ This is, of course, true 
if immorality be but an erroneous judgment. Wollaston 
does not say that immorality is just an erroneous judg- 
ment, but something very dijfferent, namely, that immorality 
is as false as a false judgment. ^^ 

Price denies that all immorality can be reduced to that of 
denying truth, or affirming a lie. Nor is he agreed that this 
can serve as a formal statement of morality ; because he says 
"there may be no intention to deny anything true, or to as- 
sent to anything false." A falsehood is not general but is 
"a distinct species of evil." Yet, Price goes right on and 
grants that in immorality we act as if the person we 
sin against did not exist, "which upon any other supposi- 
tion, is inexcusable; and therefore, figuratively speaking, 
may be said to contradict truth." He even grants that Wol- 
laston probably "meant in reality little more than this." ^^ 
Price says that cruelty can certainly be considered as act- 
ing in a way that is contradictory, but denies that the evil 
of cruelty can be regarded as the same as that of telling a 
lie. It seems to me that he and Wollaston agree entirely as 

" Wundt, Ethik, p. 323. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

" Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 460. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

** Price, Review of the Principal Questions in Morals, p. 208. 



100 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

to the relation of truth and morality, but Price thinks that 
Wollaston identifies the intellectual and the moral. ^^ 

Balguy takes very much the same attitude as Price. He 
says to treat men as brutes is as "dissonant to the nature of 
things, as would be the attempt to form an angle with two 
parallel lines ; because, as a matter of fact, there is a great 
difference between the nature of rational creatures and that 
of brutes." But he says that he would not characterize 
such conduct as acting a lie, because "that would be con- 
founding objective and subjective truth." "Neither would 
I," he says, "call it a contradiction of some true proposi- 
tion." He says that he would call immorality "a counterac- 
tion to the truth or real nature of things. If by truth is 
meant the truth of things, it may be truly said that goodness 
consists of actions in conformity thereto." ^^ Balguy evi- 
dently agrees with Wollaston and is simply trying to make 
clear the fact that goodness consists of actions conformable 
to the real natures of things, just as truth consists of ideas 
that conform to the real nature of things. I can see no 
reason why Balguy should object to calling immorality 
"acting a lie," ^^ for there is certainly a great difference 
between saying that immorality is "acting a Jie" and saying 
that all immorality reduces itself to lying. He seems to 
think that they are the same, so he accuses Wollaston of 
saying that all immorality is simply lying. 

One of the most interesting critics of Wollaston is the 
French philosopher Jouffroy who states the essential char- 
acteristics of the ethical system of Wollaston in this way: 
"According to this philosophy, good is truth, and the funda- 
mental law of conduct, the duty from which all others are 
derived, is to act conformable to the truth, or, in other 
words, not to deceive by actions." He, then, asks what 
method Wollaston uses to establish his doctrine, and he 
answers, in the traditional fashion of Wollaston's critics, 
that he "begins with the assertion that actions, like words, 
are signs, and that the truth may be affirmed or denied by 

** Price, Review of the Principal Questions in Morals, p. 693. 

^ Balguy, The Foundations of Moral Goodness, Brit. Moral., p. 79. 

*» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 11. 



WoUaston and His Critics 101 

actions as well as by words." ^^ Jouffroy fails to consider 
the distinction Wollaston makes between actions of the ges- 
ture variety that express or disguise, actions used as signs 
and constituting a kind of language, and actions "such as 
constitute the character of a man's conduct in life." ^^ He 
uses "expressed or disguised" and "affirmed or denied" with 
precisely the same meaning, whereas they mean something 
very diiFerent for Wollaston. When he says an action 
affirms a truth he is not saying that this is but another way 
of expressing the same truth as expressed in words, but this 
seems to be Jouffroy's interpretation of his meaning. To 
be sure the one kind of thing is as much conformable to true 
relations as the other but there the resemblance stops. In 
a similar way he misconceives Wollaston's meaning when 
he understands him to argue "that an action which denies a 
true proposition, is equivalent to a false proposition. A 
false proposition is bad; therefore, the action which is 
equivalent to it cannot be good." ^^ Now, Wollaston does 
not say that an action which denies a true proposition is 
equivalent to a false proposition, but what he says is that 
bad actions deny the real natures of things as truly as do 
false propositions. Wrong acts are as false and as contra- 
dictory as false propositions, because they are as incon- 
sistent with the nature of things in a coherent world, but 
this is very far from an identification of truth and goodness. 
Then Wollaston does not say that a false proposition is 
morally bad but only intellectually bad or false.^*^ 

In many places Jouffroy seems to have a very clear com- 
prehension of Wollaston's thought: "An action which de- 
nies a true proposition denies that which actually is. It is 
a revolt against reason. Such an action is contrary to the 
nature of man, for man is a rational creature and the peculi- 
arity of rational creatures is to see and love things as they 
are." ^^ Jouffroy proceeds, in the very next paragraph, 
to misinterpret Wollaston entirely: "Wollaston goes one 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
^Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, pp. 334-5. 
^ Ibid., p. 335. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 14. 
^Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, p. 336. 



102 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

step further and proves that a true proposition may be de- 
nied by omissions as well as by commissions ; or, what amounts 
to the same thing, that the omission is quite as much a sign 
as the action, and that we may affirm what is false, as well 
by the former of these signs as by the latter." He is still 
laboring under the delusion that it is Wollaston's position 
that actions are but another kind of language or medium 
of expressing thought. He thinks that this identity of 
truth and morality is brought out in Wollaston's treatment 
of the development of morality. "If science is progressive 
morality must be so too ; for, as morality is nothing more 
than truth expressed in conduct, it presupposes a knowledge 
of truth." ^^ Of course morality advances as science ad- 
vances, but this only means that as our knowledge increases 
we can act more and more in conformity with the nature of 
things. It is true that morality is truth expressed in con- 
duct, but this is saying something quite other than that 
morality is just a form of truth. A distinction must be made 
between the coherence of truth and goodness and their 
identity. A coherent world demands the unity of the two 
realms, but morality demands also the distinction of the 
world of appreciation from the world of description. Wol- 
laston did not swamp morality on the one hand, nor did he 
fail to realize its metaphysical implications on the other. 

Janet's understanding of the ethical philosophy of Wol- 
laston is much the same as that of Jouffroy. In his chapter 
on the True, the Good, and the Beautiful, he says, that 
Wollaston is "the philosopher who most emphatically main- 
tained the identity of the true and the good." He under- 
stands Wollaston to maintain that virtue consists simply in 
the affirmation of the truth. And so he does, but it must be 
remembered that the kind of affirmation of truth Wollaston 
had in mind, when he so characterized virtue, is that of a 
free moral act in conformity to the nature of things. Janet, 
apparently, understands this in the examples he gives, e. g., 
to steal is to affirm that what does not belong to us does 
belong to us, that is, our action is contradictory to facts 
" Jouflfroy, Intro, to Ethics, p. 337. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 16. 



WoUaston and His Critics 103 

and to our knowledge of them.^^ He evidently does not 
understand him, though, for he proceeds to make the tradi- 
tional criticism that Wollaston reduces all vice to lying. 
WoUaston had only said that all vice is false action, lying 
actions, you might term them, or actions that contradict 
truth, and not that all vice is lying. Vice is as absurd as 
any contradictory proposition, but it is not absurd simply 
in the logical sense of the word. The absurdity of im- 
morality consists in acting contrary to admitted logical 
truth. "Virtue is nothing else than reason," Janet under- 
stands Wollaston to mean, but this interpretation can be 
accepted only when due consideration is given to the fact 
that he insists that the will is involved in all moral behavior. 
A better interpretation, then, is that virtue is acting ration- 
ally or acting conformably to the true nature of things. He 
seems to interpret him in this way when he says that Wol- 
laston is "one of those philosophers who regard moral veri- 
ties simply as eternal and necessary relations, conformable 
to the nature of things," but he straightway proceeds to 
criticize him on the ground that he confuses the good and 
the true. "It is," he says, "quite certain that moral veri- 
ties are truths, but it does not follow that the good must 
be the true." ^^ But Wollaston never says that the good is 
the true, but only that it is conformable with the true, a very 
different thing.^^ 

Janet says that there is subjective truth, the conformity 
of thoughts to objects, and objective truth, the necessary 
and essential relations of things; but neither in the subjec- 
tive nor in the objective sense is truth identical with good. 
Certainly not, but the good is the conformity of life to 
truth and to reality. This is really Janet's own position as 
is very evident from his discussion of the subjective and 
objective good. He says: "The good, like the true, may 
also be understood in two senses . . . one objective, the 
other subjective. Objectively, the good is the character, 

« Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 106. 

" Ibid., p. 107. 

»* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat, Delin., p. 8. 



104 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

based upon the essence of things, which imposes an obliga- 
tory law upon the moral agent. Subjectively, good is the 
conformity of the will to this obligatory law.'^ That this is 
his view is made even more evident in his discussion of the 
distinctions. "Now, the objective good is not the same as 
the objective true; . . . and the subjective good is not the 
same as the subjective true. Subjectively, the true is the 
conformity of thought with its object: now, good, consid- 
ered subjectively, is the conformity of the will with its ob- 
ject. The true concerns only the understanding; the good 
concerns only the will. The conception of truth, as such, 
when it appears, is inevitable: moral action, , . . that is, 
the conformity of action to the law ... is not inevitable. 
I cannot wish that what is true should be false, nor that what 
is false should be true; I cannot wish that two and two 
would make five, when my reason shows me their sum is 
four ; but I can wish that my actions should be conformed or 
not conformed to what my reason tells me is true." ^^ Janet 
here gives his own view, incidental to his criticism of Wollas- 
ton, but I do not know of a better exposition of Wollaston's 
principle than this. His criticism of Wollaston is based on 
an entire misunderstanding of him. I think it quite probable 
that he did not know Wollaston at first hand at all, for he 
does not quote him or give any of his examples, illustrative 
of his position. How beside the point is this: "Criminal 
actions are always accompanied by more or less falsehood; 
but, as regards their nature, they are not lies." "The rob- 
ber who takes a watch, does not by this act affirm that the 
watch belongs to him; what he affirms is that he wishes to 
get the good of it, this is all that he asks. The intrinsic 
truth of the proposition matters little to him." But that is 
just the point. The robber is, on every hand, ruthlessly 
disregarding truth, acting as if it were not truth while as 
an intelligent being he can but admit truth to be truth. 
His other example is even more absurd. If a man robs a 
warehouse his denial that it is a warehouse "is only an inci- 
dental accompaniment of the act, it is not its basis." ^* 

^ Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 108. 
** Ibid., p. 108. 



WoUaston and His Critics 105 

Janet thinks that we must have a criterion other than that 
of rationality, otherwise we would not know which kind of 
truth to obey, since both good and bad actions represent 
truth. Unless one believes that there is a fundamental dis- 
tinction between good and bad how am I to know always 
just what my duty is? But what more universality and 
necessity could be desired than that of the principle that the 
good consists in the conformity of life to the nature of 
things ? ^^ 

La Rossignol says that the ethical philosophy of WoUas- 
ton is an exaggeration of the worst aspects of the system 
of Clarke. "To say that a thing is true, implies intellectual 
assent ; to say it is right, implies moral approval." La 
Rossignol says that Clarke confused these but did not quite 
identify them as Wollaston afterwards did. He says that 
Wollaston failed to notice that "nature and agreement or 
conformity of action with nature are very different kinds of 
ideas, and therefore to be applied to different things. There 
is the same distinction between them as between is and ought, 
true and right, real and ideal." ^^ He states that Wollaston's 
position is that "all sin is in effect the denial of a true propo- 
sition, and moral good the affirmation of it." He gives as 
his reference the Britannica article on Wollaston. He says 
that this represents "a curious one-sided development of 
Clark's theory of ethics. Clarke, he grants, asserts some- 
thing very similar "when he speaks of those who refuse to 
live according to the laws of justice and truth," as "endeav- 
oring to make things to be what they are not and cannot 
be, which is the greatest absurdity imaginable, ... in a 
word; all willful wickedness and perversion of right, is the 
very absurdity in moral matters as it would be in natural 
things, for a man to pretend to alter the certain proportions 
of numbers, to take away demonstrable relations of mathe- 
matics, to make light darkness, or to call sweet bitter and 
bitter sweet." ^^ "This strange language approaches very 
nearly to the assertion that 'whatever is is right'." La Ros- 

«5 Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 109. 

»> La Rossignol, The Ethical PhU. of Clarke, p. 50 flf. 

" Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 41. 



106 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

signol says that such a conclusion can be logically drawn 
from Clarke's statements that those who fail to conform 
their lives to "the eternal fitness of things are setting up 
their own unreasonable self-will in opposition to the nature 
and reason of things." ^^ 

La Rossignol says that Wollaston took as his text the 
statement from Clarke, which I have just given, that morality 
consists in the conformity of life to the reason and nature of 
things. La Rossigriol says that Clarke did not follow this 
statement to its logical conclusion, but Wollaston did. He 
thinks, also, that this statement of Clarke's suggested to 
Wollaston the "analogy between virtue and truth." If it 
is but an analogy where is the point to his criticism? As 
we have seen, he says he bases his interpretation on the 
Britannica article which reads : "Moral evil is the practical 
denial of a true proposition, and moral good the affirmation 
of it." ^® But La Rossignol fails to give any significance to 
the idea of its being a "practical," not an actual denial or 
affirmation, and he forgets that he has himself said that Wol- 
laston's method is that of analogy. So interpreted the mean- 
ing is that bad actions are as false as false propositions and 
good actions as true as true propositions ; but La Ros- 
signol's interpretation is quite different, namely, "That every 
right action is the affirmation of a truth, and every wrong 
action is the denial of a truth." *^ He takes as a case that 
of stealing, and says that it is wrong because it denies that 
the stolen property belongs to someone else. The fact is 
that Wollaston insists that the rogue admits the property 
to belong not to himself but to someone else, and herein 
consists his inconsistency and consequent immorality in that 
he "practically" denies that to which he must give assent. ^-^ 

La Rossignol makes a distinction between the teachings of 
the two moralists, Clarke and Wollaston, for which there is 
no ground. He says that while Clarke does say that every 
wrong action is absurd he does not mean that it is such be- 

^ Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 43. 

""Anon., Art. Wollaston, Britan. 

♦"La Rossignol, The Ethical Phil, of Clarke, p. 51. 

*" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 7-8. 



Wollaston and His Critics 107 

cause it is like denying A is A, as did Wollaston; but in his 
thinking "this absurdity had rather reference to the clear- 
ness of moral perception than the actual denial of a fact." 
Clarke's meaning, he says, is that "it is unreasonable to act 
wrongly," not, apparently, because immoral acts are as 
absurd as the denial of something evidently true, but "be- 
cause reason is the moral faculty, and it is unreasonable to 
deny a fact because reason asserts it." ^^ I am very sure 
that this is not Clarke's meaning, but that his conception of 
the relation of the intellectual and the moral is the same as 
that of Wollaston. He was as intellectualistic as Wollaston 
for he also made the distinguishing of good and evil a kind of 
knowledge. He, even, says that "reason is the faculty 
whereby we are able to distinguish good and evil." ^^ La 
Rossignol fails absolutely in his interpretation in that he 
does not see the significance of "willful" and "practical," as 
used by Clarke and Wollaston along with "affirmation" and 
"denial," and that this together with such statements as 
that "the very absurdity in moral matters as it would be in 
natural things" does make the distinction between natural 
and moral, between the is and the ought. 

Many of the critics of Wollaston have taken the position 
that since morality, in his system, consists in affirming the 
truth of a true proposition, it is therefore dependent upon 
correct knowledge. Garve says that it is a very ingenious 
system and that Wollaston has worked it out very skillfully, 
but says "unspeakable compulsion" is used to make "it at 
all probable that every action expresses a proposition and 
that the moral worth of that action is to be judged according 
to the truth or untruth of the proposition (dass jede Hand- 
lung einen Satz ausdriicke, und dass, nach der Wahrheit 
oder Unwahrheit dieses Satzes, die sittliche Giite jener Hand- 
lung zu beurtheilen sei)."*^ Wollaston certainly does not 
mean that every action actually expresses a proposition, but 
he means only that a good action is conformable to reality 
and so in practice affirms truth. The morality of an action 

"La Rossignol, The Ethical Phil, of Clarke, pp. 51 and 85-7. 

« Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 39. 

** Garve, Uebersicht der vornehmsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 175. 



108 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

does not consist in the truth of the proposition but in the true 
conformity of life to real relations. 

Erdmann says that Wollaston founds morality on truth 
and so "makes acting dependent on correct knowledge of 
things (das giite Handeln von der richtigen Erkenntniss der 
Dinge abhangig macht)."^^ Windelband takes the same 
position. He thinks that Wollaston reduces immorality to 
ignorance and morality to knowledge. "Wollaston says that 
since every action involves a theoretical judgment as to its 
underlying relations, the decision as to whether the act is 
right or wrong in the ethical sense depends upon the right- 
ness (correctness) or wrongness of this judgment." *^ In his 
criticism Windelband says that immorality consists not in 
having an incorrect idea of cosmic relations, but in acting 
contrary to our thinking about those relations. This I 
understand to be WoUaston's position. The theoretical 
judgment as to relations is as correct in the case of wrong 
as in the case of right action. Both equally involve the 
assent to intellectual truth. The immorality of the unsuit- 
able act consists precisely in the practical denial of ad- 
mittedly true relations.*^ 

Leslie Stephen says that the intellectual criterion made 
quite an impression upon the contemporaries of Wollaston, 
some of whom, e. g., Conybeare, speak of the theory as 
though it were a discovery in morals, fit to be placed beside 
the discoveries of Newton in astronomy.^^ But Leslie Ste- 
phen thinks that there is nothing very wonderful about it, 
since instead of explicating morals it merely confuses ethical 
and logical relations. "He who acts upon the hypothesis 
that things are so and so, proclaims by his acts that they are 
so and so ; and no act that interferes with a true proposi- 
tion can be right." Stephen says that "no act can interfere 
with a true proposition. Hence I ought not to kill a man 
because by so doing, I deny him to be a man. To which it 
was obvious to reply that my action proclaims the very 

** Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 107. 

*» Windelband, His. of Phil., p. 504. 

« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 20. 

*® Conybeare, Defence of Revealed Reli., p. 239. 



WoUaston and His Critics 109 

reverse." ^® In reply I will say that WoUaston does 
not take the position that a wrong act rests upon a false 
proposition. He misses Wollaston's meaning entirely. Of 
course "it is a verbal juggle to call an action a lie," but 
this WoUaston does not do. His position is simply this: 
one must assent to truth when clearly apprehended, but it 
lies within a man's power to practically deny a true propo- 
sition, namely, by acting as if the truth were not the truth. 
The essence of immoraUty in this is inconsistency, and it is 
the conflict between the truth of the situation and the false 
action that constitutes the inconsistency. 

Leslie Stephen thinks that this view of ethics is related 
to the "common theory of metaphysicians which identifies 
crime with error, and which had latterly been presented in 
more imposing forms by many more famous metaphysicians." 
According to this view "all immorality involves an element of 
intellectual error. To one who had adequate conceptions 
of the universe, and to whose intellect, therefore, all the con- 
sequences of his actions were immediately present, the wis- 
dom of virtue would be so evident that crime would be im- 
possible." ^^ I can see the reason for associating Wollas- 
ton's metaphysical ethics with immediately preceding meta- 
physical systems for he was undoubtedly influenced by them 
in formulating his own Weltanschauung, but I can see no 
reason for saying that he held any such view as to the rela- 
tion of virtue as Leslie Stephen attributes to him. I think 
that this misinterpretation is due to the failure to under- 
stand that WoUaston is merely describing virtue in terms of 
truth. Virtue is as true as is the truth for it is as con- 
formable to the nature of things, but it does not follow from 
this that men live up to all the knowledge that they have. 
"Things can be denied to be what they are by deeds," says 
WoUaston, which can only mean that he thinks that one can 
fail to live conformably to the knowledge that one has.^^ 

There are other critics of WoUaston who take the position 
that the language of truth is inapplicable to the moral 

*» L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. II, p. 9. 

«» Ibid., p. 10. 

" WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 



110 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

realm. Martineau says that intellectual relations do not 
give us what we want in ethical enquiries. He says that the 
understanding belongs exclusively to the unmoral world, 
the world of science. "Fitness and congruity are ideas which 
in themselves are by no means equivalent to moral concep- 
tions. They have a broad usage." To be sure "they have a 
broad usage," and, of course, they mean something just a 
little different in each connection. But Martineau goes so 
far as to say that these ideas, when applied to moral situa- 
tions, have nothing to do with constituting it moral. He 
says that Wollaston's standard of morality, namely, "con- 
formable to nature" does not constitute the ethical quality 
of a moral act.^^ His own system is so exclusively subjec- 
tive, being that of Intuitionism, that he can see no good in 
an objective principle. Antonio Aliotta says that it is 
simply impossible to discuss morality with an intellectual 
vocabulary. He says that Wollaston was one of those who 
tried to interpret the moral life in terms of logic. He says 
that Wollaston took the position that "the supreme law of 
duty can be expressed in terms of logical relations." Ali- 
otta denies that this can be done on the ground that logical 
relations have to do with the truth alone and so are inap- 
plicable to the moral realm.^^ Leslie Stephen agrees that 
this criticism is applicable. He says that the difficulty that 
underlies the reasoning of Wollaston is an obvious one. The 
logical principle is not applicable to the moral realm but only 
to the natural. He criticizes Wollaston on the score of hav- 
ing introduced the unphilosophical idea of freedom, and then 
straightway very inconsistently criticizes him on the ground 
that he neglects to consider the significant difference that 
the will makes between factual and moral relations. We 
might say A is A and then say that a denial of it would in- 
volve contradiction, "but the proposition thou shall not 
kill is a command addressed to the will, not a statement of 
truth addressed to the intellect." The attempt of Wollas- 
ton "to bring the two kinds of propositions under the same 

"Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory, p. 471. 

•^ Aliotta, La Reazione Idealistica Contro La Scienza — Subject Wol- 
laston. 



Wollaston and His Critics 111 

category involves confusion fatal to the whole theory." 
Wollaston does not bring them under the same category, 
thanks to his use of what Leslie Stephens characterizes as 
the "unphilosophical idea of freedom." ^* 

Another case of the confusion of intellectual and moral 
truth is to be found in the article on Wollaston in Franck's 
dictionary of science and philosophy. Many of the sen- 
tences are balanced sentences and the two conceptions of 
truth are frequently found in the same sentence. It is 
stated that Wollaston sought to define the idea of the good 
and to prove that it may be resolved into the idea of the 
true, but whether he thinks of this as purely abstract truth 
or truth in the sense of true to all of life is not clear. "To 
act conformably with truth is to act well; every bad action 
is a lie." ^^ The first part of the statement can be accepted, 
if by truth be meant significant life relations and this is 
apparently the meaning. It does not follow from this that 
"every bad action is a lie," unless he means that acting im- 
morally is "acting a lie," which does not seem to be his 
meaning. Wollaston does not reduce all immorality to ly- 
ing, except in the sense that immoral acts are equivalent to 
"acting a lie." He says, in justification of the phrase, that 
a man may so live that "his whole conduct breathes un- 
truth," so, he asks, "may we not say that he lives a lie?" ^^ 
The article continues : "Wollaston says that a person alters 
truth by actions as by words." This is certainly a mistaken 
interpretation, for Wollaston insists that truth cannot be 
altered but that assent to truth is determined. He does 
say, however, that immorality is really as absurd as would 
be the attempt to deny evident truth. The same thing can 
be said of the statements in regard to the violation of con- 
tracts : "To violate a contract is to deny it in action." 
Intellectually a contract cannot be denied but it can be 
denied in action, by which Wollaston means that a man can 
"practically" deny a contract, act as if he had made no con- 
tract. Thanks to the fact that one's will is free one can 

"L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. II, p. 7. 
'^Anon., Art. Wollaston, Francke Diet. Des Sciences Phil. 
"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 11. 



112 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

act as if that which is were not, and as if that which is not, 
were.^^ The article goes on to say that, "Not to keep one's 
word is also to deny the promise made, to do the contrary of 
that which one has promised." Wollaston does not say that 
one denies a promise by breaking a contract, for the fact 
that one has made a promise is, according to Wollaston, 
absolutely irrefragable. But one can "do the contrary,'' 
which would be just as contradictory as "to deny the prom- 
ise made." The one, however, is possible while the other is 
impossible. The same misunderstanding of the relation of 
the intellectual and the moral is evident throughout the ar- 
ticle. For example, it is said that, "To disfigure truth 
through one's acts means necessarily to do evil." ^^ Yes, but 
this does not mean what he says it does, namely, that the 
disfiguration of truth by an act of immorality is "the same 
thing as to uphold a false proposition." It is, however, 
says Wollaston, "as contrary to the nature of things" as 
would be the impossible attempt "to uphold a false propo- 
sition." ^^ 

Irons says that Wollaston "obliterated all distinctions 
between the moral and the rational." In proof of this. Irons 
says that he teaches that a rational being observes that 
things bear certain relations to other things, and that 
because of these evident natures and relations, thus ob- 
served, he can discern certain moral relations. Reason, 
therefore, not only enables men to ascertain what is true, 
but also to recognize how they ought to act. Wollaston 
makes the difference between moral good and evil to be at 
bottom the same as the difference between true and false, 
and since truth consists in recognizing things to be what they 
are, virtue consists in "treating things as being what they 
are." He teaches, says Irons, that virtue is the practice 
of truth, and vice, therefore, the practice of lying. But this 
is not even a confusion of the two, and certainly not an oblit- 
eration of "all distinctions between the moral and the ra- 

"Francke, Die. Des Sciences Phil.— Art. Wollaston, p. 1728. Wol- 
laston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 10. Clarke, Evidences, p. 188. 
^ Francke, Die. Des Sciences Phil. — Art. Wollaston, p. 1728. 
*«• Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 



WoUaston and His Critics 113 

tional." His quotation from Wollaston certainly does not 
confuse the two : "A true proposition may be denied, or 
things may be denied to be what they are, by deeds as well 
as by express words." ^^ Irons says that "from WoUaston's 
standpoint the murder of a fellow being is merely an action 
which denies an evident truth, namely, that the victim is a 
fellow being." He criticizes Wollaston on the ground that 
he ought to express the heinousness of the crime in stronger 
terms, but it must be remembered that he is speaking of im- 
morality universally.^^ Wollaston insists that there are 
truths of very different values, and consequently degrees of 
morality and of immorality.^^ Irons continues : "From this 
point of view, the standard of right and the criterion of truth 
are the same." "Since reason determines what ought to be 
done, it must use its own criterion, namely, self-consistency. 
. . . The distinction between right and wrong is therefore 
the same as the distinction between true and false. A vicious 
action is one which involves a contradiction." ^^ This, Irons 
thinks, means that right action and correct thinking are es- 
sentially identical. The truth is that Wollaston considers 
them alike only in the respect that consistency and inconsist- 
ency can be considered the norm in each. Wrong actions are 
as inconsistent with reality, as contradictory therefore, as 
false statements in regard to indubitable facts. The neces- 
sary consequence of this position. Irons says, is that the 
dynamic force which impels us to act rightly is the same as 
that which makes us think correctly. The nature of things 
does "impel" man to act morally or conformably to his rela- 
tions, but since he is free he can act inconsistently. Man's 
intellect, on the other hand, is determined; — the mind must 
assent to necessary truth. This distinction Wollaston cer- 
tainly does make.^^ 

The criterion of morality, according to Irons, is not logi- 
cal consistency but harmony with the possibilities of the 

"» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

*^ Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Rev., vol. 12, pp. 138-9. 
"^^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 

^ Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Rev., vol. 12, pp. 139 If. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 7-8 and 62 ff. Irons, Rational- 
ism in Mod. Eth., Phil. Rv., vol. 12, p. 140. 



114 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

nature of the agent. Wollaston would answer that the na- 
ture of the agent and his possibilities constitute important 
factors, perhaps the most important, in the moral situation, 
but logical consistency would still be the best formula of 
morality. Morality is as consistent with the nature of 
things as is the logical conformity of truth to the nature of 
things. Irons says that Kant uses the criterion of truth 
but that he "does not assert with the earlier rationalists that 
a vicious action involves a contradiction. For to have 
said that would have been to grant that the self-contradic- 
tory can exist, which would be the same as admitting that a 
square circle is a possible fact." He says that Kant gets 
around the absurdity, that Wollaston fell into, by saying 
that wrong actions would be contradictory and absurd if 
universalized.^^ In reply to this I would say that Kant cer- 
tainly does not mean that the particular immoral act is not 
absurd and contradictory. He only says that we perceive 
its contradictoriness by trying to think what would be the 
inevitable consequences of its becoming a universal law. The 
maxim which is implied in the breaking of a promise, for 
example, "could never hold as a universal law of nature, 
but would necessarily contradict itself." The very point 
of the rationalistic argument is that a particular wrong act 
is as contradictory as would be the maxim on which it is 
based becoming a universal law of nature.^^ 

II. Criticism 

THAT IMMORALITY, AS WELL AS MORALITY CONFORMS 

TO NATURE 

The criticism that immorality affirms things to be as they 
are as truly as does morality, and that, consequently, 
truth, or conformity to the nature of things, cannot consti- 
tute a true criterion of morality is a criticism frequently 
offered against the Ethics of Wollaston. This criticism is 
very much like the one discussed in the preceding chapter. 

'^ Irons, Rationalism in Mod. Eth., Phil. Rv., voL 12, pp. 138-55. 
" Kant, Meta. of Morals, Sec. II. Simmel, Einleitung in die Moral- 
wissenschaft, vol. 2, ch. 5. Caird, Critical Phil, of Kant, bk. 2, ch. 2, 



Wollaston and His Critics 115 

That criticism is that Wollaston's system is based on a con- 
fusion of ethical and logical relations. Truth and falsity, 
it is said, cannot be the differentia of moral and immoral 
because that would simply identify the very different cate- 
gories of truth and goodness. The criticism with which I, 
now, wish to deal is that truth is as much affirmed by im- 
morality as by morality, that we are conforming our ac- 
tions to the natures of things just as truly when we do 
wrong as when we do right, consequently a moral criterion 
other than that of conformity to the nature of things must 
be sought. Both criticisms are based on the same confused 
interpretation of Wollaston, namely, that of failing to com- 
prehend what he means when he says that truth can be denied 
by deeds as truly as by words.^^ 

Selby-Bigge states well this objection to Wollaston's cri- 
terion of morality. He says that it is quite true that a moral 
act "must not violate the physical laws of the universe, and 
in this sense must be suitable to the nature of things," but 
"such violation would constitute folly rather than vice."* 
And, furthermore, Selby-Bibbe says, that "an action which 
was calculated with the most exact reference to physical 
conditions might yet be a very bad one." ^^ Why should 
suitable to the nature of things be restricted to the 
physical laws of the universe.'' Is it not true that moral 
laws also violate or conform to the nature of things.'' Wol- 
laston makes it very clear that this is his meaning. He re- 
alizes that both good and bad acts conform to physical 
laws, but bad acts violate the real nature of things in that 
they violate the nature of persons, which must be considered 
of as much importance as physical things and for moral 
purposes of supreme importance. His teachings on this 
point are brought out most clearly, perhaps, in his cases 
of bowing to a post and breaking a drinking glass. ^^ To be 
sure it is just folly to violate the laws of mere things, but 
it is both folly and vice to violate the nature of personality. 
That this is true is evident from the fact that Wollaston 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 

«« Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, p. XXXIV. 

~ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 15 and 31. 



116 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

never makes moral judgments except where persons are 
involved. For him personality always constitutes one term 
of the proposition or else it is not a moral judgment, and no 
morality attaches to conduct unless it involves persons. 

Martineau offers this same criticism in very much the 
same form as Selby-Bigge. He says that good and bad 
acts both conform to the nature of things. "These con- 
ceptions are as applicable to the act of stabbing a man with 
a dagger as in the blow that turns the dagger aside and 
saves a life. Then, too, the act of the one is as conformable 
to the character of the man as is the other." '^^ Janet takes 
the same position: "Actions regarded as criminal do, in 
reality, represent truth, just as truly as do honorable and 
generous actions." That a man can dispose of the lives of 
his fellow creatures because of his strength and his passions, 
is a perfectly true proposition. It is true that I can appro- 
priate the property of others. These propositions are just 
as true as are the converse ones.'^^ The answer to these 
criticisms of Martineau and Janet is very simple and evident. 
True propositions are, of course, affirmed by criminal acts, 
but essential truths are violated by acts not conformable 
to the nature of things. Wollaston says that truths are of 
very different degrees of importance, and he says also that 
that which determines the importance is human happiness 
and welfare.^^ Von Hartmann thinks that the principle is 
far too broad because many things that are true cannot be 
convertible into action, and even those special truths which 
are convertible may still be morally speaking entirely indif- 
ferent. He grants, however, that it is a true negative prin- 
ciple of morality, because immorality is always in contra- 
diction to truth. Wollaston never tries to prove that all 
truth is of moral significance in the sense that every intel- 
lectual proposition can be converted into moral actions. "^^ 

John Clarke says that we may grant that "every immoral 
action denies some truth, . . . but then he must be forced 

'» Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory, p. 472. 

"Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 108. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Prop. IX. 

"Von Hartmann, Phanomenologie des Sittlichen Bewusstseins, p. 344. 



Wollaston and His Critics 117 

to allow that every such action . . . does as well affirm truth 
as deny it." He thinks that from this fact the conclusion 
can be drawn that "let the action deny what truth you will, 
yet since it affirms other truth, this is as sufficient to bring 
it under the denomination of virtuous." '^^ This is of course 
true provided morality consists in mere affirmation of any 
kind of truth, but this is not Wollaston's view. John 
Clarke says that he is not at all sure "that all immoral 
actions deny more truth than they affirm," so it cannot, he 
thinks, be argued that they are for that reason immoral.^^ 
As many truths, he thinks, could be affirmed in regard to 
"any species of vicious actions" as "could for the denial 
of it." In the first place, I would answer, it is not the posi- 
tion of Wollaston that immorality is just a denial of a true 
proposition. In the second place, considering truth in the 
broad sense as true to life relations and meanings, as Wollas- 
ton does, John Clarke certainly cannot deny that vicious 
actions are false. They are in conformity to some particu- 
lar truths, to be sure, but they deny the larger truths of 
the indissoluble unity of life and the world. ^^ 

The rationalistic system of Wollaston was criticized by 
Hutcheson w^ho said that moral distinctions must be re- 
ferred not to the reason, but to an internal sense. He says 
that one can make as many true propositions about a bad 
action as about a good one, consequently moral laws must 
be a good deal more than such truths. The criterion of 
truth and the standard of right are different, otherwise 
true propositions could not be made about wrong actions. 
Hutcheson says that both virtuous and vicious actions con- 
form to truth, and so truth cannot be the standard of 
virtue.^^ I am very sure that this is no refutation of 
Wollaston, for it is his contention that only true proposi- 
tions can be made about matters of fact. We can, how- 
ever, act in a manner inconsistent with truth and thus 
virtually deny, in practice, what we must assent to theoret- 

" J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Good, etc., p. 17. 

"Ibid., p. 19. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 48-9 and 71. 

" Hutcheson, Essay on the Passions, Treatise II, sec. 1. 



118 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

ically. Of course propositions that are true can be used 
in describing or discussing evil actions, but this constitutes 
no disproof of the thesis that evil is a denial of truth and 
that goodness is an affirmation of truth.^^ We constantly 
speak of men acting inconsistently, meaning thereby, just 
what Wollaston means, that their actions are untrue, that 
they are not living conformably to the true nature of 
things. This does not mean that the truth element is by 
any means all that there is to vice and virtue, nor does 
Wollaston claim that it is. In fact he makes a great deal 
of the volitional element, going so far as to insist that with- 
out it there can be no morality. It is not moral truth until 
we will the truth to be actualized in our lives. ^^ 

Sir James Mackintosh made an objection to WoUaston's 
rationalistic method similar to that made by Hutcheson. 
Sir James insists that the terms relation and conformity 
to nature apply as much to vice as to virtue and that both 
good and bad actions must conform to the natures and rela- 
tions of things. ^^ Warlaw answers this objection by say- 
ing that of course every act must in adapting means to 
ends conform to the nature of particular things and rela- 
tions. The vicious act of necessity conforms to the nature 
of many particular things and relations, but it also vio- 
lates the nature of things in many essential respects. The 
virtuous act conforms universally. It is congruous with 
its relations. ^^ 

Brown questions WoUaston's criterion of morality on 
the ground that both virtuous and vicious actions are con- 
formable to the nature of things. He takes WoUaston's 
case of talking to a post. "Now, you see that on his scheme 
of absolute irrelative truth, the absurdity of talking to a 
post is precisely of the same nature with that of injuring 
a man: For in both cases, we treat the post and the man, 
as being what they are not. Consequently, on this philoso- 
phy, if it be morally evil to injure a man it is likewise 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

" Ibid., p. 7. 

^° Mackintosh, Dissertation on the Progress of Ethical Phil. 

»i Warlaw, Christian Ethics, p. 306. 



Wollaston and His Critics 119 

morally evil to talk to a post." Wollaston, he says, would 
not claim this, of course, but since, according to his system, 
truth is equally violated in either case and as there is some- 
thing highly immoral in the one and nothing immoral in the 
other this cannot be the criterion of morality.^^ Saying 
that all immorality is absurd and contradictory is very 
different from saying that all absurdity and contradiction 
constitutes immorality. It is the simple fallacy of conver- 
sion. In the process of conversion an A proposition loses 
its universality, and becomes only the particular proposi- 
tion I. All immorality consists in absurdly denying a thing 
to be what it is or in affirming it to be what it is not. It 
does not follow that every case of absurdity is immoral, 
for many cases would be nothing more than stupid mistakes 
or jokes. This Brown admits and argues from this that 
Wollaston's principle cannot constitute the criterion of 
morality. A distinction must be made between error and 
immorality. Error is only a false existential judgment, 
and it is only when we act falsely that we are immoral. 

No morality attaches to acts that do not violate the 
nature of personality. Treating a post as a man, then, is 
essentially different from treating a man as a post. There 
is absurdity in both cases but not the same kind of ab- 
surdity. Then, is not Brown right in saying that this is 
resorting to another criterion of morality? No, because 
in every moral situation personality must be involved, and 
if it is a case of immorality it must be the nature of the 
person rather than that of the thing that is violated. 
Wollaston says that things have moral relations only when 
attached to persons in some way.^^ In spite of the denial 
of John Clarke and Brown, it is also true that the intention 
of the actor is a factor in the determination of the quality 
of the act, in Wollaston's system. In fact he makes it a 
pre-condition of morality that the agent act intelligently 
and freely.^* This certainly means that the intentions of 

«' Brown, Essays, p. 263. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 
«« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 15 and 27. 

" Ibid., p. 7. J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Moral Good, 
etc., pp. 5-11. 



120 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

the agent are essential factors in making moral evalua- 
tions. 

Brown, then, proceeds to criticize Wollaston's statements 
in regard to the case of the man in distress. Wollaston^s 
position is that to refuse to help a man in distress is to 
deny the man's distress to be what it is and personality to 
be what it is.^^ "These strange denials we certainly do 
not make," Brown insists. I would answer that of course 
we do not, nor does Wollaston claim that we do. He, in 
fact, insists upon the point that as intelligent beings we 
cannot deny the truth to be the truth. What we can do, 
however, says Wollaston, is to act as if the truth were 
not the truth or to "practically deny" what we theoretically 
admit to be true.^^ Brown continues, "All which we tacitly 
declare is, on the contrary, a truth, and a truth of the most 
unquestionable kind." To be sure we declare all of these 
things to be true, Wollaston would say, otherwise there 
would be no morality attached to the situation. Brown 
says that "We affirm ourselves to be what we are, indif- 
ferent to the miseries of others ; and if to affirm a truth 
by our actions be all which constitutes virtue," we have 
acted as virtuously as we would have had we gone imme- 
diately to the aid of the suffering man.^^ This statement 
of Brown's is absurd because real truth is denied by such 
action, and certainly one who acts in such a way acts con- 
trary to the real nature of man. 

In criticizing Wollaston, Jouffroy says, that, "In the 
appreciation of actions we must come to judgments which 
do not coincide materially with moral judgments. There is 
no bad action which does not express, equally with a good 
one, many true propositions." The man who poisons an- 
other conforms to many true propositions. To be sure he 
does but he also contradicts true propositions and those 
contradicted are the one's essential to morality.^^ There 
are, says Wollaston, many true propositions which imply 

^ Brown, Essay II, Sec. 3. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 17. 
Ibid., pp. 8 and 11. 



" Ibid., p. 17. Brown, Essays, p. 265. 

«8 Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, vol. II, p. 336. 



Wollaston and His Critics 121 

no moral relations, since persons are not involved.^^ It is 
not, he says, immoral to speak to a post. True, this is 
treating the post as a person, but it does not violate the 
nature of personality.^^ Jouffroy's case of administering 
arsenic Wollaston would treat in this way. The nature of 
arsenic is not violated, but, in fact, many true propositions 
are conformed to in the action, e. g., arsenic is poison, poison 
will kill. The nature of the person, however, is violated and 
many true propositions are thereby denied, the principal 
one of which is that a person is a person and should always 
be treated as such. So I cannot agree with Jouffroy, when 
he says that Wollaston's fundamental maxim is too com- 
prehensive and confounds evil with good. 

"There are," says Jouffroy, "many truths which it is 
morally indifferent whether we affirm or deny by actions." 
As a case he takes two cold men, one of whom draws near 
a fire while the other gets near a piece of ice. The act of 
the one affirms a true proposition, which the act of the other 
denies. But says Jouffroy, there is no morality in the action 
of the first man, nor immorality in the action of the second 
man; but only reasonable action in the one case and foolish 
action in the other. He says : "Absurdity and immorality 
are not coincident." ^^ To this Wollaston agrees, but he 
insists that immorality is absurd, not that every case of 
absurdity is a case of immorality but that immorality is al- 
ways absurd.^^ 

Because absurdity and immorality are not coincident it 
by no means follows that it is not the fundamental prin- 
ciple of ethics, that moral actions are those which affirm 
true propositions and do not contradict the nature of 
things. Jouffroy says that "when we meet a traveler in a 
wood, it is equally a crime to maintain that his purse does 
not belong to him, as to take it, for in either case we equally 
deny the same true proposition." ^^ Of course we deny true 
propositions in both cases, but the second case represents 

«» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 31. 
"^ Ibid., p. 27. 

" Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, vol. II, p. 338. 
»2 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 27. 
«3 Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, p. 339. 



122 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

an action based on the denial of a true proposition and, 
more important still, it represents a case of an action which 
is in contradiction to the most important of all truths, 
those concerning persons.^* Jouffroy further argues that 
this moral principle would equalize virtues, "for if morality 
consists in not denying a true proposition, then all good 
actions are equally good, and no difference can be discov- 
ered between them." It is the essence of reason, he grants, 
to respect essential relations and to act conformably thereto, 
but it does not follow, he thinks, that because these rela- 
tions constitute truth that they also constitute goodness. 
Conduct may be reasonable without being virtuous and it 
may be unreasonable without being wrong. "We are in 
error, and act without conformity to the nature of things, 
when we attempt to warm ourselves with ice; but such con- 
duct is not immoral; the two spheres of absurdity and im- 
morality do not coincide." ^^ 

Wollaston does not, as I have just said, argue for the 
coincidence of truth and goodness, but it by no means fol- 
lows from this that the good cannot be best defined in 
terms of conformity to objective relations, to the nature of 
things. The case just mentioned by Jouffroy as being 
morally indifferent might very easily become a moral situa- 
tion the moment the conformity or non-conformity to the 
nature of things involved, not merely the nature of fire 
and the nature of ice, but that of sentient beings, and espe- 
cially that of persons, the conduct would take on a moral 
tone. Wollaston never claims that all relations are morally 
significant, and he certainly never contends that immorality 
can be predicated of conduct that does not violate the 
nature of sentient beings. He considers the inhumane treat- 
ment of a lower animal and says it is wrong both because 
it contradicts the sentient nature of the animal and also be- 
cause the man who does such a thing violates his 
own nature. The last factor is the significant one because 
no moral character can attach to conduct that does not 
involve persons either as subject or object. He would have 

»* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Prop. IX. 
'"Jouirroy, Intro, to Ethics, pp. 337-9. 

\ 



Wollaston and His Critics 123 

everything treated as what it is, although things are of very 
different importance. One is, he thinks, mistreating his 
mind when truth is disregarded.^^ 

It is characteristic of rational beings. Irons says, to act 
with due regard to the nature of things which is the same 
as acting rationally, but this has no moral significance. It 
is, of course, true that we cannot say that all acts in con- 
formity to the nature of things are moral acts, nor, even, 
that all contradictions are immoral. It does not follow from 
this, as Irons thinks, that we have to seek elsewhere for our 
moral criterion. He takes the position that if conformity 
is to constitute the criterion of right, then "every act which 
is performed by an intelligent being is right." No, an A 
proposition does not distribute its predicate but only its 
subject; consequently it does not follow that because the 
right is always that which conforms to the truth, that the 
truth is always moral and certainly not that every act of an 
intelligent being will be moral. If Wollaston's criterion 
be true, says Irons, it follows that the murderer who takes 
a life conforms his conduct as much to the nature of things 
as does the good Samaritan who saves a life.^^ This can- 
not be said with truth for while the murderer does conform 
to certain laws of physics his act virtually denies many 
essential life relations and meanings. He acts, says Wollas- 
ton, as if certain things which are true were not true.®^ 
The act of the good Samaritan is quite different for it is 
consistent with the true nature and relations of things. He 
conforms not only to a few physical laws but to the very 
nature of the universe, while the murderer's act is in con- 
tradiction to the greater truths of the universe and in con- 
formity only to a few relatively insignificant physical laws. 
As Wollaston expresses the matter, "In order to judge 
rightly what anything is, it must be considered not only 
... in one respect, but also what it may be in any other 
respect; . . . the whole description of the thing ought to 
be taken in. . . . All truths are consistent, nor can any- 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 15, 27 and 31. 

" Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Rev., voL 12, pp. 143-3. 

•» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 9. 



124 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

thing be true any further than it is compatible with other 
things that are true." ^® 

The most absurd criticism passed upon Wollaston from 
this point of view is that of Hume. In discussing judgments 
"which are the effects of our actions, and which when false, 
give occasion to pronounce the actions contrary to truth 
and reason," Hume makes the very clever assertion that 
actions never cause judgments in our own minds but only 
in the minds of others. Hume's argument is very subtle 
but is, I think, false. My wrong act, he argues, is based 
on a true proposition, for I know the facts to be as they 
are. He takes the case of someone seeing through a win- 
dow the lewd behavior of a man with his neighbor's wife. 
The innocent spectator might suppose the woman to be 
not the wife of a neighbor but the man's own wife and so 
might make a false judgment in regard to the situation. 
"In this respect my action resembles somewhat a lie ; only 
with this difference, which is material, that I perform not 
the action with any intention of giving rise to a false judg- 
ment in another, but merely to satisfy my passion. I cause, 
however, a mistake and false judgment by accident; and 
the falsehood of its effects may be ascribed, by some odd 
figurative way of speaking, to the action itself." ^^^ In 
reply, I will say, that the immoral, as Wollaston thinks of 
it, always rests on a true judgment of the actor and it is 
this which constitutes the differentia of the immoral from 
the merely erroneous. The essence of immorality consists 
in acting as if the known truth were not the truth. Wollas- 
ton mentions a case very much like that of Hume, namely, 
that of Isaac and Rebecca. In discussing this case Wollas- 
ton says that a man may act a lie, and such acted lies are 
such because there is a contradiction between the actions 
and the evident truth of the situation.^^-"- 

Hume, even, undertakes to refute Wollaston's point in 
regard to freedom, saying that this does not clear up the 
difficulty in regard to identifying goodness with truth be- 

«> Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Prop. VI. 
"" Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 461. 
*<" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 11. 



Wollaston and His Critics 125 

cause freedom does not explain how an action produces in 
us an erroneous conclusion. He argues that, according to 
Wollaston's principle, if the man, who was having illicit 
relations with his neighbor's wife, had taken the precaution 
to close the blinds there would have been no immorality 
because in that case the action would have given rise to no 
false propositions. ^^^ Wollaston would answer that while 
neither the man nor the woman were affirming false proposi- 
tions but true ones, factually speakiAg; yet, by their action, 
they were denying true propositions. Intellectually they 
could but assent to the truth of their natures and relations, 
and yet practically they were denying the truth of those 
natures and relations. All the while things were as they 
were, and to that they could not refuse to give their assent, 
but being morally free they could by action deny the truth, 
that is act as if the truth were not the truth, but as if the 
truth were quite otherwise.-^^^ 

III. Criticism 

THAT WOLLASTON OBSCURES THE REAL NATURE OF MORALITY 

One very common criticism against Wollaston's system is 
that the real nature of morality is obscured by his intel- 
lectualistic criterion and that, consequently, no content is 
given to morality. The criticism appears in several forms. 
One set of critics simply say that it is an empty form and 
that it is, consequently, entirely useless as a guide to one 
who is seeking the way to live morally. Others object to 
the system simply because they have no faith in the intellect 
as the criterion and guide of morality. They think that 
the criterion is a moral sense or a moral faculty and that 
reason is only a means to an end. This criticism is based 
largely on an entirely wrong interpretation of Wollaston. 
In the first place this intellectualism is given an intution- 
alistic interpretation, the good being made a matter of 
simple and immediate intellection ; wliile, as a matter of fact, 
it is really an objective system of ethics based almost en- 

^"^ Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 461. 
!<» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 



126 The Ethics of William WoUaston 

tirely on experience and ratiocination.^^* Then, too, his 
notion that intellectual assent is necessitated, but that 
moral acts are free is not properly evaluated.^*^^ We cannot 
do otherwise than assent to what we think to be true. This he 
makes to be the very corner-stone of his system, but his 
critics say that it is a mere truism to say that we must 
assent to the truth. It is a self-evident fact that an intelli- 
gent being cannot deny intellectually what he knows to be 
true, and that a free moral being can act contrary to the 
recognized truth. That a thing should be treated as what 
it is is as much a truism as are the primary laws of thought. 
Wollaston sought to base Ethics on a foundation as in- 
dubitable as that of logic. Just as surely as the fact that 
A is A is the ethical truth that A should be treated as A. 
But an intelligent being must be intelligent and assent to 
truth, but he is under no compulsion in regard to acting 
morally.^^^ Immorality is as inconsistent as intellectual 
contradiction, because the immoral person realizes that he 
is acting on the assumption that something he knows to be 
false is true or that something he knows to be true is false. 
So the critics say that if this is all there is to the system 
of Wollaston, then, his conception is self-evident but that 
his system is purely formal. 

Wundt says that the extreme intellectualism of Wollas- 
ton's system "almost entirely obscures the specific content 
of morality (der specifische Inhalt des Sittlichen vollig zum 
verschwinden kommt)."^^*^ If he objects to Wollaston's 
system on the ground that it does not give content to 
morality. We might say that this same objection can be 
made against any principle of morality. The content of 
morality cannot be prescribed in any theory of morals. 
Circumstances will largely determine the content of mo- 
rality, and judgment must decide in the particular situations 
of life just what is the right thing to do. An ethical ideal 
can only guide the judgment and only a legalistic principle 

"* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 

"" Ibid., pp. 7-8 and 42. 

"« Ibid., p. 8. 

"^ Wundt, Ethik, p. 323. 



Wollaston and His Critics 127 

of morals can do more than this. Wollaston does, however, 
give copious suggestions as to the application of his prin- 
ciples to the various kinds of situations of life. 

Jouffroy says that he grants that a good act is never 
false but is always in harmony with truth, that it is con- 
formable with the relations resulting from the nature of 
things. He thinks, though, that there are only "certain 
relations which are moral, only certain true propositions, 
which we are bound to express by our acts." He says that 
Wollaston's system fails in that it does not give the dif- 
ferentia of morality in such a way that one can know just 
what acts are moral. He does not, Jouffroy says, differ- 
entiate between moral and reasonable or between immoral 
and unreasonable. The defect of his system is, Jouffroy 
thinks, "confirmed by the fact that the psychological coin- 
cidence is equally wanting with the external coincidence." 
He grants that we do find it necessary, oftentimes, to con- 
sider both our own nature and the nature of other beings 
and the relations existing between them and ourselves be- 
fore we can decide what we ought to do. This, he says, is 
to enable us to ascertain what is good and what we ought 
to do.^^^ This is Wollaston's position only he contends that 
this is all that is needed to determine what ought to be done 
in any situation of life. Wollaston's criterion is an ob- 
jective one. He says: "Just let things speak for them- 
selves," which means that we are to find out what things 
are and then treat them accordingly.-^^^ Jouffroy, unlike 
Wollaston, thinks that there must be some specific moral 
principle.^ -"^^ 

If all truth be so very sacred, says John Clarke, that 
men should have regard for it in all their conduct and if 
vice consists entirely in its opposition to truth, it follows 
that "the affirming of truth, any truth whatever by word 
or deed . . . should be looked upon as a virtue." He, 
then, attempts a reductio ad absurdum argument. He says 
that silly idle consequences follow from such a view. The 

^"^ Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, pp. 336-8. 
^* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
""Jouffroy, Intro, to Ethics, p. 339. 



128 The Ethics of WUliam Wollaston 

affirmation of every truth becomes a duty. He says, "it 
will be a glorious exercise for a man to spend his time in 
thrumming over such worthy and weighty propositions as 
these, a man's no horse, a horse no cow, a cow no bull, nor 
a bull an ass." ^^^ Mr. Wollaston's general idea of moral 
good and evil cannot be a true conception, thinks John 
Clarke, "because it does not rest upon the tendency, wherein 
precisely the moral good or evil of human actions consists; 
and besides ... it is hardly applicable to any species of 
human actions, except those of affirming or denying truth 
by words." He says that, "To pretend that cruelty and 
injustice is denying a man to be a man," is nothing but 
"mere rant," borrowed from a hyperbolical way of aggra- 
vating the absurdity of such behavior, without ever strictly 
meaning what is said." ^^^ 

John Clarke says that, "He everywhere speaks of own- 
ing things to be as they are, as in itself a matter of the 
highest importance, as the ne plus ultra, beyond which no 
man needs or ought to go in his enquiries, what is fit or 
proper to be done or not ... as if that alone was a thing 
desirable in and for itself." This Clarke says "is a con- 
tradiction to the common sense and experience of mankind. 
For a little reflection may quickly satisfy anyone that noth- 
ing but pleasure or happiness is or can be desirable upon 
its own account, without reference to anything else. And 
that other things are desirable and pursued by us, only so 
far as they are considered by us to be the means of attain- 
ing pleasure or happiness. . . . Happiness, in short, is the 
ultimate end of all our aims and designs, all our wishes and 
desires. This ... we constantly and steadily pursue. Nor 
can it be otherwise. And for the truth of this I appeal to 
the inward feeling and experience of all mankind." ^^^ 
Clarke says that Wollaston practically admits this, when 
he says that "pain considered in itself, is a real evil ; pleasure 
a real good. . . . Pleasure is in itself desirable, pain to be 

^ J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Moral Good, p. 19. 
^ Ibid., p. 6Q. 
"' Ibid., pp. 46-7. 



Wollaston and His Critics 129 

avoided." ^^* Clarke says that "owning things to be what 
they are" is not in itself desirable, but "desirable" only "as 
... a means, more or less conducive to the end of all our 
wishes and desires, happiness." ^^^ 

John Clarke accuses Wollaston of insisting that things 
b€ treated as they are "without regard to consequences." ^^^ 
But, as a matter of fact, Wollaston is very insistent upon 
the fact that things cannot be treated as they are without 
entering into a consideration of possible consequences, espe- 
cially as to human happiness. Clarke says that Wollaston 
talks like one who is a stranger to human nature when he 
speaks as if happiness were a "matter of secondary con- 
sideration to abet the practice of truth." He says that 
instead of the Author of Nature appointing happiness "to 
encourage the practice of truth," the "regard due to truth 
... is purely and solely with a view to the well-being and 
happiness of mankind." -^^^ This, of course, Wollaston does 
not deny but he insists that welfare and happiness are what 
is meant by truth of ethical signification. The essential 
difference between an objective system of morals, like that 
of Wollaston, and a view of morals, which makes the Tight- 
ness or wrongness to depend upon the intentions entirely, 
is that consequences, in so far as they can be anticipated, 
are duly considered. The consequences expected to result 
from an action is the determining factor in the motivation 
when conduct is objectively evaluated. It would certainly 
be the height of irrationality to disregard consequences. 
While Wollaston considers happiness to be a matter of the 
highest importance and insists that nothing can be really 
good which makes for the destruction of human happiness, 
he would not go as far as John Clarke when he says that 
"mankind, neither are, nor can be concerned for anything 
but happiness. . . . Owning things to be what they are, or 
a conduct conformable to truth, can signify nothing to 

^" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 35. 

""J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Moral Good, etc., p. 48. 

"« Ibid., p. 48. 

"' Ibid., p. 48. 



130 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

mankind any further than it is a means to promote their 
happiness." ^^^ 

Hume says that no conclusion as to the nature of virtue 
can be drawn from the mere assertion that "we perceive an 
act in certain relations to be virtuous or vicious," nor can 
we say what faculty perceives the relation. It may be 
granted that the same act in the same relation is always 
virtuous or vicious, "if relations be taken in the widest 
possible sense, but," says Hume, "that is a barren proposi- 
tion." ^^^ To be sure it is barren in the sense that it does 
not state the content of morality, but to give definite and 
fixed content to morality is legalism. No ethical theory 
undertakes to give the specific content of morality. It is 
true that some of the intuitionists say that certain acts are 
always and everywhere virtuous or vicious in all relations, 
e. g., telling the truth and keeping faith. Wollaston thinks 
that even these are but instrumental or the mere means to 
the realization of personality and that there are circum- 
stances when to be true to real relations would involve 
breaking a covenant or the violation of some other general 
moral rule. He would say that no particular thing is al- 
ways right or wrong. It is, he says, generally right to tell 
the truth but there are occasions, when the telling of truth 
would contradict truths more important to humanity than 
merely verbal lying. To "merely deny truth by words . . . 
is not equal to a denial by facts." He says that "all sins 
against truth are not equal, and certainly a little trespass- 
ing upon it in the present case, for the good of all parties," 
and where humanity demands it, is justifiable.-'^^^ 

After Von Hartmann's long quotation from Garve, which 
he thought to be Garve's translation of Wollaston, in which 
he gives cases of morality explicated in terms of the criterion 
of truth, he makes this criticism : "Aside from the partial 
inaptitude of this concrete exposition there appears, at first 
sight, a forced and artificial nature in the whole mode of 

"^J. Clarke, Exam, of WoUaston's Notion of Moral Grood, etc., p. 51. 
"* Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 469. Selby-Bigge, British 
Moralists, p. XXXV. 

"" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 30. 



Wollaston and His Critics 131 

action." ^-^ I understand Von Hartmann to mean that 
when Wollaston says "that to make a slave of a man is the 
same as to say: dieser Mensch ist ein verounftloses Wesen, 
which I can treat as horses and oxen," that he understands 
him to merely assert that a man is a creature without feel- 
ing and that he does not at all show wherein the wrongness 
consists. He says that Wollaston presupposes that every 
action is consciously a logical consequence of certain pre- 
mises and that the consciousness of the immorality of the 
action consists in the consciousness of the fallaciousness of 
one or more of the premises. "To tell the truth, however, 
an action," says Von Hartmann, "hardly ever comes about 
in the manner here supposed, and where this is really the 
case and the fallaciousness of one of the premises really 
enters into consciousness, this theoretical consciousness is 
only an incidental circumstance and no how identical with 
the consciousness of the immorality of the action." ^^^ 

Von Hartmann says that there is nothing in the system 
of Wollaston which is not a truism and gives that as the 
explanation of its unfruit fulness and for the fact that it 
had little influence on subsequent systems. At the very 
most the demand of objective reasonableness, the moral prin- 
ciple of truth, is an inadequate solution of the problem, for 
it only teaches us how to avoid wrong and directs us to the 
right path for the solution of the problem.^^^ I would an- 
swer that Wollaston's principle is supposed to be accept- 
able to all rational beings. It is supposed to be as in- 
dubitable as the laws of thought, and this I suppose, is the 
pre-condition of its being true. Wollaston, everywhere, in- 
sists that reasonableness of principle coincides with objec- 
tive reasonableness. He, everywhere, pre-supposes that act- 
ing rationally means the same as acting in conformity to 
the nature of things. -^^^ 

Falckenberg makes a similar criticism to that of Von 
Hartmann: "The course of moral philosophy has passed 

^ Von Hartmann, Phanomnologie des Sittlichen, etc., p. 345. 
""Ibid., p. 345. 

^ Hartmann, Phanomnologie des Sittlichen Bewusstseins, p. 345. 
^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Paragraph V. 



132 The Ethics of William WoUaston 

over the Ethics of Clarke and Wollaston as an abstract and 
unfruitful idiosyncrasy." ^^^ Of course Ethics must be 
abstract in principle, for how else could it be universal 
and ideal? And if by unfruitful he means lacking in con- 
creteness, I would answer that the content of morality can 
be as easily supplied to this as to any other system of 
Ethics. It can, in fact, be supplied more easily because 
the natures and relations, the conformity to which consti- 
tutes morality, determine the specific content of morality. 
Falckenburg, however, says this of the effort to find an 
objective and universal standard in place of the subjective 
and individual standard of the school of Hedonism; that 
while these thinkers had plans greater than their per- 
formance still "the search for an ethical norm which should 
be universally valid and superior to the individual will did 
not lack justification." ^^^ 

Leslie Stephen characterizes Wollaston's system as In- 
tuitionism. "He tried to argue from our a priori knowledge 
of the essence of the divine and human nature, and not from 
the a posteriori experience of their relations." He says 
that this effort of Wollaston represents an attempt to use 
a method belonging to the theological stage of thought. 
The a priori method, he says, could be used appropriately 
in a system of theological Ethics. A set of rules inde- 
pendent of experience might be deduced from the belief in an 
omnipotent ruler, for given such a Supreme Being "it was 
easy to infer what should be the conduct of his creatures." 
But Leslie Stephen thinks that this method is inapplicable 
when for the God of traditional theology is substituted the 
'^conception of a supreme nature." ^^'^ I agree entirely with 
him that the doctrine of an infallible conscience must go 
with the giving up of the doctrine of a personal God. I 
do not, however, agree with his characterization of Wollas- 
ton's system as intuitional. Stephen says that "the nuga- 



** Falckenberg, His. of Modern Phil., p. 190. 
"•Ibid., p. 190. 

127 



Leslie Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. II, p. 8. 



Wollaston and His Critics 133 

tory character of Clarke's system appears in the curious 
development given to it by Wollaston." He says that 
Clarke "wished to elevate morality into the sphere of pure 
mathematics where the promptings of passion and the les- 
sons of experience should be entirely excluded." He thinks 
that Wollaston's development from Clarke is in the direc- 
tion of considering absolute and abstract logical truth as 
the criterion of morals. I cannot think this to be a true 
interpretation. I think that Wollaston did develop from 
the position of Clarke, but not in the direction of Intui- 
tionalism. The development was towards a more completely 
rationalistic position, or, perhaps, it would be better to say 
that it was a development in the direction of a more purely 
rationalistic position. Clarke thought that the reason is an 
all-sufficient moral guide but thought that revelation was 
necessary to reveal the sanctions of morality, without which 
the majority would not have strength enough to do that 
which their reason prescribes. Wollaston thought revela- 
tion to be entirely unnecessary.^^^ 

I cannot reconcile Leslie Stephen's statement that "he 
refused to interrogate nature, in order to discover what is 
pleasing to the God of nature," with Wollaston's injunction 
to "just let things speak for themselves and they will pro- 
claim their own rectitude or obliquity." ^^^ Wollaston can 
only mean by this that the nature of things determine moral 
obligation. I am very sure that Leslie Stephen is wrong 
in thinking that Wollaston bases all truth upon intuition. 
He says that Wollaston's system was based upon an ob- 
jective basis but claims that this objective truth is deduced 
intuitively.^ ^^ The only ground for this interpretation is 
the fact that W^ollaston believed that there is a rational 
factor in knowledge and in morality. In regard to the 
rational and necessary factor in morals, Wollaston only 
said that it is necessarily true and so can be known 
a priori, that one's acts should conform to the truth of 

^ Anon. Art., Wollaston, Chambers' Ency., vol. 16, p. 709. 

*=» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 

"° L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. II, p. 9. 



134 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

things. As to what things are and our relations thereto, that 
belongs to the a posteriori, the empirical factor.^^^ 

Jodl thinks that Wollaston's moral criterion is not ulti- 
mate. He does not believe that even Wollaston himself is 
guided by such a relative standard. He says that accord- 
ing to such a method there can be no absolute distinction 
between good and evil, "because it nowhere leaves the neigh- 
borhood of relativity.'^ Jodl characterizes Wollaston as 
a symptomatic moralist, "sympotmatische Ethiker" by 
which he meant that Wollaston really resorted, in the last 
analysis, to a higher ethical standard and that conformity 
to nature was not his criterion but only a symptom of the 
ethical. Jodl says that he did not deny the influences of 
religion and that he believed that the human being is de- 
pendent upon "another of endless goodness." Jodl says 
that Wollaston believes that "from this source as well as 
from the unity of all individuals arise the virtues of piety 
and justice, of kindness and sobriety in connection with 
the Golden Rule of the gospel." ^^^ 

In connection with his exposition of the ethical teachings 
of Hume, Von Gizycki takes occasion to offer a criticism 
of the ethical system of Wollaston. He thinks that Wollas- 
ton was the most consistent thinker of his school, but he 
agrees with Hume that his method was artificial and that 
he was guilty of reasoning in a circle. He says that 
"Wollaston's doctrine has the relative merit to have ex- 
pressed with naive frankness the actual consequences of 
this entire tendency." ^^^ He understands this to be purely 
formal Intellectualism. 

In his exposition of the Ethics of Home of Karnes, Norden 
gives some consideration to the Ethics of Wollaston. H^ 
agrees with Lord Kames in his estimation of Wollaston. 
Norden characterizes his Ethics as resting on an autonom- 
ous foundation, "autonomer Grundlage," and he agrees with 
Kames that this is an impossible foundation upon which to 
rest a system of Ethics. It may be said that, as a matter 

"» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 42 ff. 

^=» Jodl, Ethik, p. 145 ff. 

"'^ Von Gizycki, Ethik Hume, p. 7. 



Wollaston and His Critics 135 

of fact, Wollaston did not believe that Ethics could rest 
on an "autonomer Grundlage," but, rather, that he was 
very insistent upon the fact that morality must be made to 
depend upon real objective relations. Lord Karnes' system 
is also objective in a sense. He says that "any action con- 
formable to the common nature of the species, is considered 
by us as regular and good." This "common nature . . . 
every person . . . who is not a monster possesses. It is 
fit and proper . . . and it is a beautiful scene to find crea- 
tures acting according to their nature." ^^* Kames, like 
Wollaston, says that the moral rule "by which we ought to* 
regulate our actions" is that of "acting according to nature, 
acting so as to answer the end of our creation." Kames, 
however, differs very greatly from Wollaston in regard to 
the way we discover what is and what is not conformable 
to nature. He thinks that we have a moral sense, for he 
says "thus we find the nature of man so constituted, as to 
approve certain actions and to disapprove others ; to con- 
sider some actions as fit, right and meet to be done, and to 
consider others as unfit, unmeet and wrong." ^^^ Norden 
and Kames agree that Wollaston is right when he makes 
morality to consist in a life conformable to nature but 
wrong in that he "puts reason in the place of feeling." It 
can be said that their interpretation of Wollaston makes 
him an intuitionalist rather than a rationalist. It may be 
also said that Kames and Norden believe in an "autonomer 
Grundlage" and that their Ethics is really intuitionistic, 
for a moral sense as truly as an innate idea of morality is 
equivalent to an intuition. Norden agrees with the conten- 
tion of Kames that Wollaston's reduction of all immorality 
to the lie is unnatural and forced. He also agrees that 
Wollaston is guilty of the fallacy Petitio Principii. "Why," 
asked Kames, "is theft a lie?" He answers, "Of course 
because the thief has obliterated the distinction between 
mine and thine. But what is meant by this is mine? Noth- 
ing but: I have a right to that particular one, and it is 
therefore wrong if someone else robs me of it. So the idea 

"* Norden, Die Ethik Henry Home of Kames, pp. 37-8. 

"^ Kames, Essay on the Prin. of Morality, Brit. Moralists, 300 if. 



136 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

of right and wrong are here already presupposed." He 
says that what is said of theft may be said of other vices ; 
we know that they are wrong immediately. Norden says 
that one would naturally expect for Wollaston to tell why 
the lie is immoral but he does not do so. "He has," says 
Norden, "left it to everybody's conviction, with the same 
right, however, he could have left the other vices to our 
inner conviction (unserer inneren Uberzengung)." ^^^ 
Kames goes so far as to say that: "To maintain that the 
qualities of right and wrong are discoverable by reason is 
no less absurd than that truth and falsity are discoverable 
by the moral sense." '^^'^ 

Von Hartmann thinks that Wollaston used the criterion 
of truth in a purely formal way. Von Hartmann, however, 
accepts truth as his own standard of morality, but supposes 
that he is using it in a very much broader sense than did 
Wollaston. This is not, by any means, the case, for "truth 
to all of life" and not just formal truth is certainly Wollas- 
ton's idea of morality. He thought that Wollaston's use 
of truth is quite other, so, he says : "If we ask what remains 
of the moral principle of truth when we have removed the 
erroneous presupposition upon which it rested with Wollas- 
ton we find the demand for the objective reasonableness of 
our actions for which a criterion other than that of Wollas- 
ton's formal theoretical principle must be sought." And 
we find, also, "that all moral laws and ethical rules are com- 
prised in their systematic connection in the principle of 
truth." This does not mean that every individual act can 
show in all cases harmony with individual truth, which he 
thinks to be Wollaston's idea ; theory and practice are far 
too independent for that, and besides our entire knowledge 
of the phenomenal world may not suffice to form the basis 
of absolute morality. In fact, he says, only that theoretical 
knowledge is capable of this "which leads beyond the phe- 
nomenal world to the reality revealing itself in it, that is 

136 Norden, Die Ethik Henry Home of Kames, p. 29. Kames, Essays 
on the Prin. of Morality, Brit. Moral., 306. 
"^ Home, Sketches. 



WoUaston a/nd His Critics 137 

metaphysics." ^^^ So, Von Hartmann says, "if one under- 
stands by truth . . . the true metaphysical knowledge, 
then Wollaston^s principle receives a significance, of course, 
far from being recognized by Wollaston himself, 
namely that true Ethics can be based only on true meta- 
physics." ^^^ 

IV. Ceiticism 

THAT THE NATURE OF VIRTUE IS NOT DEFINED BUT ASSUMED 

There is another criticism which has frequently appeared 
to the system of Wollaston, namely, that he does not define 
the nature of virtue but merely assumes it. Those who 
make this type of criticism are, as a general thing, those 
who hold either the view that virtue is sui genesis or else 
that it is based on feeling. If one believes that the criterion 
of morals is an inner sense or an intuition, which is imme- 
diate and indubitable requiring neither experience nor ratio- 
cination, it follows, of course, that any attempt to state a 
moral ideal in rational terms is a gratuitous procedure. 
The same, of course, can be said of the view of the world 
that would make morality a matter of feeling. 

This criticism was first offered by the contemporary 
ethical writer, John Clarke,^*^ who asked: "But supposing 
actions rightly denominated immoral did really imply a 
denial of truth, ... a denial of things to be what they are ; 
yet how will it follow from such a denial, that those actions 
therefore are truly and properly immoral, that is contrary 
to the will and good pleasure of God, declared by the voice 
of reason, or the light of nature.''" For this, he says, 
Wollaston offers several reasons. Clarke goes on to say 
that "the difficulty of making a determination will grow 
with the number of significations the same action may have 
... to different people." The "civility of a sharper," for 

^^ Hartmann, Phanomonologie des Sittlidien Bewusstseins, p. 345. 

"» Ibid., p. 346. 

*"» J. Clarke, Exam, of Wollaston's Notion of Good, etc., p. 19. 



138 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

example, makes a very different impression upon a green- 
horn to that made upon a man of the world. 

Selby-Bigge is rather typical of those who make this 
criticism. He says that ''relation" can only be used 
"figuratively" in morals. He says : A "good deal of the 
intellectualist argument turns upon merely verbal ambig- 
uity; relation, agreement, congruity, suitableness, fitness 
form a series which lead, conveniently but loosely, from the 
non-moral to the moral." These terms are meaningless, 
Selby-Bigge thinks, except when thought of in connection 
with happiness or some other end without which they have 
no moral connotation. Abstract conformability of actions 
to things "is certainly not sufficient to constitute virtue, 
and it is impossible to give a definition of virtuous conform- 
ability without including in the definition the idea of 
virtue." ^'^^ Conformity of life to the nature of things does, 
it seems to me, define morality as clearly as does any other 
ideal of morality. Any ideal must be stated in an abstract 
and formal way, or else it will not be universal and conse- 
quently not an ideal at all. The content always comes from 
experience and involves moral judgment. It is a stock argu- 
ment and has been offered against many ethical systems 
that another criterion is implied in the very statement of 
the ideal. Intellectualists can certainly use it as effectively 
as can any other school, for they all presuppose the uni- 
verse to be consistent and so must think of morality as acts 
that cohere with the rest of things. So can we not say that 
the other ethical systems all presuppose the idea of con- 
sistency.'^ Wollaston does, in fact, do just that thing with 
happiness when he says that no one can refuse to consider 
happiness as what it is for it is a part of the real nature 
of man.^^^ 

In criticism of Wollaston, Rogers says that to say that 
right action is reasonable or natural appears to mean little 
more than that it is reasonable and natural to do what is 
right. Rogers says that these moralists, Clarke and Wollas- 
ton, constantly insisted upon the fact that moral and scien- 

*« Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, p. XXXIII. 
i*=» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. DeHn., p. 37. 



WoUaston and His Critics 139 

tific truth have the same rational characteristics in order 
to show that all truths are universal and objective.^*^ Say- 
ing that it is reasonable and natural to do what is right does 
not preclude the idea of reasonableness and naturalness as 
the standard of what is right, nor does the belief that moral 
truth is as universal, as rational, and as objective as scien- 
tific truth preclude the possibility of morality being essen- 
tially another kind of thing from intellectual truth.^^^ 

Martineau agrees with Wollaston that morality cannot 
rest on the senses. "But the next step," he says, "I find 
impossible to take; I cannot say that this exclusion from 
the category of sense drives the moral insight into that of 
the understanding." He thinks that there is a middle 
ground between sense and intellect. He believes that there 
are "intuitive rules of the will," which present themselves 
to us not as "theoretical disclosure" but as a "practical 
imperative." The moral consciousness does not present it- 
self to us as "so it is" but as "so it ought to be." -^^^ Very 
true, but it is an intellectual matter and is based on the real 
nature of things empirically and rationally arrived at. I 
cannot believe that there is any middle ground between sen- 
sationalism and rationalism in morals. Wollaston recon- 
ciles the empirical and rational factors in knowledge and 
says that both experience and ratiocination have a part in 
determining what our duty is.^'^^ A true intellectualism 
will also treat the entire sense life as good when properly 
controlled by intelligence. ^^"^ 

Hume says of Clarke and Wollaston: "They thought it 
sufficient if they could bring the word relation into the argu- 
ment without troubling themselves whether it was to the 
purpose or not." He thinks that it is an incorrect theory 
of morals which places virtue and vice in relations, because 
if the virtue of an act is a relation, then "all relations dis- 
coverable by reason obtain as much between inanimate ob- 

i« Rogers, Short His. of Ethics, p. 151. 

^** Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

"5 Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory, p. 478. 

"« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. DeUn., p. 43. 

"» Ibid., p. 45. 



140 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

jects or animals, as between persons." ^*^ No, Wollaston 
would reply, the same kind of relations cannot obtain be- 
tween mere things and animals as obtain between persons 
and things, persons and animals, and persons and persons. 
The correlatives have considerable to do with the determina- 
tion of the relations. Wollaston takes the position that 
breaking drinking glasses is different from breaking heads 
and that treating a post as a man is different from 
treating a man as a post. He says in effect that a 
person must be one of the correlatives in moral relations. ^^^ 

Hume denies that there is any such thing as a moral rela- 
tion. I understand Wollaston to take the same position. 
It is not the relation itself that determines whether the 
situation be moral or non-moral but the things related. An 
act of man is moral, immoral or non-moral according to its 
conformity to the real nature of things, including persons 
and God. I cannot see the force of the criticism that this 
leaves the nature of the moral relation unexplained and that 
the standard of morality is either assumed or still to be 
found. ^^^ Hume says that there must be an "oughtness 
relation" in order for morality to be a matter of relations. 
And he thinks, also, that this relation must be perceived 
by a different kind of reason.^ ^^ This objection is based 
on a misunderstanding of Wollaston, namely, in regard to 
the distinction between existential and moral judgments. 
The different thing involved in the moral relation, the thing 
that can convert almost any factual relation into a moral 
relation, is the clear recognition by a moral agent of the 
nature and relations of things and of his relation thereto. 
Morality, then, from this point of view, is just the form of 
action which devolves upon us because of the relation of 
ourselves to the rest of things, because of the indissoluble 
unity of life and the world.^^^ 

Hume says that the person who takes the property of 
another does in a manner declare it to be his own. "This 

*" Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 464. 

"» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 27 and p. 15. 

"" Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 464. 

"^ Ibid., p. 467. 

^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 50-1. 



WoUaston and His Critics 141 

falsehood is the explanation of injustice, but these notions 
of property right and obligation presuppose an antecedent 
notion of morality." Wollaston's explanation only shows 
why any wrong act is wrong, but what wrong itself is, that, 
Hume says, is presupposed. So he is driven back to answer 
the question why truth is virtuous and falsity vicious. ^^^ 
In answer I will say that Wollaston did not say that truth 
is virtuous or falsity vicious, but only that virtuous acts 
are acts which are conformable to true natures and rela- 
tions.^^* 

Janet says that if there were in nature only factual rela- 
tions, "relations of parts to whole, of orders, species, law 
and phenomena, there would be mathematical, logical, and 
physical sciences, but there would be no moral sciences." I 
cannot see that Ethics requires relations other than these, 
or rather that these, when related to human lives, become 
ethical relations. Janet follows Maleb ranch in saying that 
moral science implies that there are between things "rela- 
tions of perfection, of dignity, and excellence. ... It is 
because one thing is better that it is our duty to prefer it." 
Janet says that the idea "good implies that there is between 
things or attributes, an order of quality distinct from the 
order of quantity, whether mathematical or logical. If you 
suppress the quality of things, you suppress all that renders 
one thing more estimable than another." ^^^ The moral 
judgment is certainly a quality judgment, but is this quality 
not determined by relations of truth? But Janet says that 
"if you refuse to accept an objective hierarchy of goods, 
nothing remains but a subjective scale of pleasures." 
Wollaston agrees that this is the case. He is as insistent 
as Janet upon the belief that a true system of Ethics must 
be objective. He believes that there is "an objective 
hierarchy of goods" but thinks that these are constituted 
by the real relations of things and persons and that all 
relations are capable of becoming moral relations. ^^^ The 

*^ Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 462. 
^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 9. 
*" Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 109. 
^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 



142 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

mere mathematical, logical and physical become moral when 
human lives become involved with them. There are between 
things "relations of perfection, of dignity, and of excel- 
lence," but this does not mean that one thing is per se better 
than another, that all depends entirely upon circumstances 
and relations. Shakespeare has one of his characters say: 
"I perceive that there is nothing good without respect." 
Janet continues : "Truth in general comprises, then, all 
kinds of objective relations: good concerns only relations 
of perfection." ^^^ To this Wollaston would agree pro- 
vided he means that there can be morality only when human 
ideals and human volitions are involved. Wherever these 
are involved we have "relations of perfection," in addition 
to the mathematical, the logical and the physical relations. 
It is not true that there are any things that are always and 
ever3rwhere good or bad, only their relations to human lives 
constitutes them good or bad.^^* 

Janet grants that when the question is pushed back into 
metaphysics the good and the true become the same kind 
of eternal relations. "Can it, then, be said that the good 
and the true have not mutual and profound affinities, or 
even that they do not flow from a common source.^^ The 
good and the true, which are separate in human vision, must 
mingle at their source. From the same origin comes the 
being and the goodness of things." He agrees with Descartes 
that God is the author of eternal verities. The ideal for 
man is not, Janet says, something foreign to him, but "it 
is his own essence. Being born a man, he ought to try to 
be a man so far as is possible." To do this often involves 
a struggle between a man's larger self with his narrow in- 
di\'idual self. "But the individual himself has a distinct 
essence which he should respect." This, he says, is our 
author's view and it is also Kant's idea. It is the view that 
attributes to the human personality an intrinsic worth, an 
absolute value. Janet admits that it is this worth of per- 
sonality which must constitute the relations of perfection, 
dignity, and excellence, but he does not seem to realize the 

"^ Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 110. 
^ Ibid., p. 31. 



Wollaston and His Critics 143 

implication of his admission.^ ^^ Consistency would demand 
that he recognize that there is no great difference between 
Wollaston's philosophy and his own. He makes the good to 
consist in the coordination of all ends, which is precisely 
Wollaston's view, who is very insistent on the point that all 
relations must be considered. ^^^ But still Janet speaks of 
morality as if it were sui genesis saying that good and per- 
fection are ends for man, and, he says, "it would be more 
exact to define the end as being the good, than the good as 
being the end." 

Garve says that this system of Wollaston would be one 
of the most complete if it were not too metaphysical for use, 
and if a moral philosophy is to set forth only the nature 
of an already accepted virtue and not also the origin and 
development of virtue in human nature. Garve says that 
people had ideas of virtue long before any such criterion, as 
conformity to nature, was proposed. So instead of this 
being the true and original idea, it is rather a derived and 
artificial formula to which they attach their original and 
natural conception of virtue. •'^^-'^ I think that Garve has 
a wrong conception of the task of Ethics. I understand 
Ethics to be a normative science, the business of which is 
to evaluate human conduct, which it must do in the light 
of an ideal or criterion of morality. The natural history 
of morals is a most interesting and enlightening study, but 
it belongs rather more to psychology and anthropology than 
to ethics. Garve criticizes Wollaston, also, on the ground 
that "no man in acting morally or immorally is conscious 
of making any such speculation in regard to the moral judg- 
ment of his action. He says that it is not the testimony of 
moral consciousness that his conscience accuses him of noth- 
ing but lack of veracity, when it accuses him of unjust and 
treacherous actions, and that accords approval for chari- 
table and beneficent acts only because he has expressed true 
propositions thereby." Garve says that since this is true 
we must look elsewhere for a criterion for what does not 

^■^ Janet, Theory of Morals, p. 111. 

*•» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 

"^ Garve, Ubersicht der vornehmsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 171. 



144 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

really move man to virtue can also not be the human prin- 
ciple of virtue, "Was aber keinen Menschen zur Tugend 
wirklich bewegt, das kann auch nicht das menschliche Prin- 
cipi der Tugend sein." ^^^ Now, as a matter of fact, Wollas- 
ton does not say that one makes such speculations at the 
moment of action. He only says that a bad man in acting 
in a manner unsuitable to the nature and relations of things 
is acting in a contradictory manner. He is not, according 
to Wollaston, making false existential judgments, but his 
actions are as false as such judgments. -^^^ 

Brown thinks that this system is dependent upon some 
other for the determination of virtue and vice. He says: 
"If we had no previous notions of moral good and evil, no 
love of the happiness of others more than their misery, it 
would be absolutely impossible to determine whether virtue 
or vice were truth or falsehood." If we make the presup- 
position or take for granted that it is the true nature of 
the child to love its parents. Brown says, that, of course, 
we can say that when the child acts tenderly in its dealing 
with its parent, that it "treats the parent according to his 
true nature," and that if his treatment were unkindly, that 
"he would not be treating his parent according to his true 
nature, but as if he were a foe, to whose true nature such 
usage would be accordant." So, Brown says, that Wollas- 
ton takes virtue for granted in the conception of true nature. 
He thinks that this principle is worthless and that it really 
implies another criterion of virtue, namely, that of Intui- 
tionism. Immorality is conduct which "is false to nature, 
but it is false to nature only, because it is false to that 
virtue," which is "a natural idea" in the minds of men.-^^* 
This objection can be made of any principle which tries to 
explain morality, but to denominate virtue "native," "intui- 
tive," "immediate" is certainly not to explain it. Wollaston 
dealt with this type of ethical theory in this way; the dif- 
ference between good and evil cannot be deduced from the 
common sense of mankind : "For it is much to be suspected 

^"^Garve, Ubersicht der vornehinsten Prin. der Sittenl., p. 175. 
i*" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. DeUn., p. 8. 
*" Brown, Phil, of Mind, p. 264. 



Wollaston and His Critics 145 

there are no such innate maxims as they pretend, but that 
the impressions of education are mistaken for them: and 
besides that, the sentiments of mankind are not so uniform 
and constant, as that we may safely trust an important dis- 
tinction upon them." ^^^ 

Blakey takes Brown to task for his superficial criticism 
of Wollaston. How can anyone, Brown had said, believe 
that parricide is a crime, only because it is absurd, "only 
for the same reason which would make it a crime for any 
one to walk across a room on his hands and feet, because 
he would then be guilty of the practical untruth of using 
his hands, not as if they were hands, but as if they were 
feet, as, in parricide, he would be guilty of the practical un- 
truth of treating parents as robbers." ^^^ This, Blakey 
says, is a strange misconception of the reasoning of Wollas- 
ton. To treat parricide as no worse crime than walking 
across the floor on hands and feet, "is not to treat those 
two actions according to the nature of things, or as being 
what they really are, but the contrary." He mentions the 
fact that Wollaston anticipates this very objection in his 
case of a man talking to a post, which act he characterizes 
as absurd but not immoral. ^^^ 

In his defence of Wollaston against the misinterpretation 
of Brown, Blakey seems to understand the position of Wol- 
laston, but later in his treatment he says that this philoso- 
phy, really, goes back to an ultimate Intuitionism. He 
thinks that man has a special faculty for discerning moral 
relations, that the ordinary reason is impotent as to the 
decision of moral questions. If this is really WoUaston's 
position, of course, Blakey is right in saying that "this 
amounts to the same as a moral sense, a moral intuition." 
I do not think, however, that his argument, which attempts 
to prove Wollaston an Intuitionist, is at all convincing. He 
says that Wollaston takes the position that when a man 
performs a given moral action, that action bears a certain 
relation to the constitution of things that all men are capable 

"= Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. 

^•^ Blakey, His. of Moral Science, pp. 195-6. 

"^ Brown, Phil, of Mind, p. 264. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 15. 



146 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

of discerning this relation. How is this to be done? How 
are men to perceive those relations between moral actions 
and the natures of things? Wollaston has not shown, he 
says, "that this power differs in any respect from moral 
sense." Wollaston's idea, according to Blakey, is that men 
"approve of moral actions by the power of perceiving a 
relation between those actions and other things," which is 
certainly a fair characterization.^^^ These two interpreta- 
tions cannot be reconciled and the fact is that the last one 
must be accepted for there is not the slightest evidence for 
the position that Wollaston believed in a moral sense. For 
Wollaston reason is the only guide and he did not believe 
in any special moral reason, but, rather he thinks that moral 
relations are discerned by the same reason as logical and 
mathematical relations. ^^^ Wollaston definitely denies that 
he believes in innate ideas of morality or in a moral sense. 
He says "They, who . . . deduce the difference between 
good and evil from . . . certain principles that are born 
with us, put the matter upon a very infirm foot, for it is 
much to be suspected there are no such innate maxims." -^^^ 
Price says that which determines whether an action is 
right or wrong is "the truth of the case," by which he means 
"the circumstances and relations of the agent and the ob- 
jects." In certain relations "there is a certain right thing 
to do. A certain manner of behavior we approve as soon 
as the circumstances and relations are known. What is 
good or bad, it is certain, must vary according to the dif- 
ferent natures and circumstances of beings." ^^^ Price 
thinks that if the relations were otherwise a different kind 
of behavior would be demanded by the situation, and this 
different kind of behavior would, then, be right. After prac- 
tically stating Wollaston's view as his own. Price proceeds 
to say that such expressions as "acting suitably to the 
natures of things, treating things as they are, conformity to 
truth, congruity and incongruity between actions and rela- 

*<» Blakey, His. of Moral Science, pp. 201-2. 
"» Wollaston, ReH. of Nat. Delin., p. 23. 
"° Ibid., p. 24. 
*" Price, Questions in Morals, p. 205. 



Wollaston and His Critics 147 

tions, have little meaning if they are intended to define 
virtue." These expressions, he says, "evidently presuppose 
an idea of virtue." Saying that virtue consists in con- 
formity to the relations of persons and things does not define 
virtue. Price says, "and we will still have to tell why it is 
right to conform ourselves to these relations." To answer 
this, he thinks, that we can only fall back on "something 
ultimately approved for which no justifying reason can be 
assigned." Saying that virtue is the conformity of our 
actions to reason is just saying "that our actions are such 
as our reason discerns to be right." Price says so far from 
conformity to nature being a guide to us in critical situa- 
tions of life, as a matter of fact, when we cannot determine 
what is right we are equally unable to tell what is conform- 
able to the nature of things. ^"^^ He is saying that we must 
have a more ultimate criterion than that of truth because 
we cannot always discover the true nature of things or 
decide just what conduct is conformable thereto. 

Price is wrong in saying that a more ultimate definition 
of virtue is implied by this one for no more ultimate con- 
ception can be conceived than that of conformity to the 
real nature of things. This conformity of life to reality 
must be the ground of morality and so must be the criterion 
of every view of Ethics. For, as Wollaston says, "if the 
formal ratio of moral good and evil be made to consist in a 
conformity of men's acts to the truth of the case . . . the 
distinction seems to be settled in a manner undeniable, in- 
telligible, practicable. For as what is meant by a true prop- 
osition and matter of fact is perfectly understood by every- 
body." ^^^ But Price thinks that there is a more ultimate 
conception and that it is a matter of immediate perception. 
He says that morality is not a matter of any deductions of 
reasoning; but, he says, morality is determined by the 
natures and relations of things. "Treating an object as 
being what it is, is treating it as it is right such an object 
should be treated." Conforming ourselves to truth is the 
same as doing what is right to be done in the situation in 

"^ Price, Questions in Morals, pp. 206-7. 
"3 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 25. 



148 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

which we find ourselves, and Price seems to think that we 
have immediate knowledge as to what we ought to do. He 
thinks that the notion of right and wrong is presupposed in 
acting according to truth. He says that Wollaston is wrong 
in making his notion of good and evil to consist in the 
"signifying and denying of truth," because it is an attempt 
to reduce "all virtue and vice to these particular instances 
of them." This, he says, leaves the nature of them unde- 
fined, "nor does he tell us how we come to the idea that 
virtue is observing truth and vice the violation of it." Price 
says that Wollaston merely takes these as self-evident truths. 
Price agrees that they are such but, he says, "not more so, 
than our ideas of the other principles of morality." Cruelty, 
for example, is for Price a vice sui genesis and it cannot be 
made to consist of the denying of truth, because when one 
acts cruelly he may have "no intention to deny anything 
true." One may. Price says, be said, figuratively speaking, 
to contradict truth when he acts in a cruel manner." One 
could not, however, use such language did he not "perceive 
antecedently to this application, that such a manner of act- 
ing, in such circumstances, is wrong." ^^^ Price grants that 
Wollaston used the relation in a figurative way, so the real 
difference between them is not this, but as to the real nature 
of the moral judgment. Price makes it "a simple percep- 
tion, . . . something ultimately approved for which no 
justifying reason can be given." ^^^ When virtue is said to 
consist in the conformity to the relations of persons and 
things, one cannot be said to have really defined virtue in 
the sense of giving a guide to life, for saying that virtue is 
conformity of our actions to reason is just saying that 
virtuous actions are such as our reason discerns to be 
right.^^® Wollaston does not agree with this, for he says 
the conformity of our actions to reason is precisely what 
we mean by acting virtuously, and he would also say that 
we must use our reason to find out just what is the rational 
thing to do.^"^"^ 

"* Price, Questions in Morals, pp. 207-8. 

"» Ibid., p. 206. 

"•Ibid., p. 209. 

»" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Paragraphs VI and IX. 



Wollaston and His Critics 149 

John Gay says that most moralists agree as "to what 
are virtuous and vicious actions," that is as "to what par- 
ticular actions are virtuous and what otherwise," but he 
says they differ "very much . . . concerning the criterion 
of virtue." He says that some "have placed it in acting 
agreeably to nature, or reason; . . . others in conformity 
with truth; others in promoting the common good; others 
in the will of God, etc." Now, he thinks, that this agree- 
ment as to what particular actions are right and wrong, 
along with this great disagreement concerning the criterion 
of morality, makes one suspect, "either that they had a 
different criterion" or "that all of them have the same 
criterion in reality." He takes the latter view saying that 
they all have the same ultimate standard and that this is 
that of acting agreeably to the will of God. Because God 
is infinitely good "he could have no other design in creating 
mankind than their happiness," consequently my own duty 
consists in "promoting the happiness of mankind. How 
shall I know what is for the happiness of mankind .^^ He 
says that "this is to be known only from the relations of 
things." 1^8 

Gay takes Wollaston's criterion of virtue and makes it 
his criterion of happiness. He asks how one is to discover 
what does conform to the nature and relations of things, 
and he answers "either from experience or reason." So he 
agrees with Wollaston as to the method of ascertaining 
truth and the nature of the actions that are conformable 
thereto. "Thus the criterion" of conformability to the 
nature of things "may in general be said to be reason ; which 
reason, when exactly conformable to the things existing, 
i. e., when it judges of things as they are, is called right 
reason." ^'^^ He gets very near to WoUaston's position 
when he says that we speak "of the reason of things," mean- 
ing "that relation which we should find by our reason, if 
our reason was right." He says that "reason," "truth," 
"conformity to relations," "fitness and unfitness of things," 

"« Gay, Concerning the Fundamental Prins. of Virtue, Brit. Moralists, 
pp. 270-2, 

^^ Ibid., p. 273. 



150 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

"the happiness of mankind" ; "may in some sense be said to 
be criteria of virtue ; but it must always be remembered that 
they are only remote criteria of it ; being gradually subor- 
dinate to its immediate and proper criterion, the will of 
God." ^^^ Wollaston would answer that virtue is acting 
conformably with the will of God but that this is revealed 
to us in the very nature of things. In discussing the idea 
of Plato that virtue is "likeness to God" Wollaston says 
that such likeness can be attained only by "the practice of 
truth, God being truth, and doing nothing contrary to 
it." ^^^ Again, he says, the great law of natural religion, 
"the law of nature or the Author of nature, is, that every 
intelligent, active, and free being should so behave himself, 
as by no act to contradict truth ; or, that he should treat 
everything as being what it is." ^^^ Instead of admitting 
that Gay is right in his position that every ethical standard 
can be reduced finally to that of conformity to the will of 
God, I would say, rather, that Gay is compelled to use the 
criterion of conformity to truth in order to give any mean- 
ing to his criterion. This means that conformity to nature 
is his real criterion for, like Wollaston, when he asks "Lord 
what would Thou have me do.^" he can get no other answer 
than that of Wollaston's principle of conformity to the 
nature of things. He admits that God's will is revealed in 
the nature of things. Man's duty, he says, is to promote 
"the happiness of mankind," and what this is can "be known 
only from the relations of things." ^^^ 

V. Criticism 

THAT WOI.I.ASTON's SYSTEM IS OVER INTELLECTUALISTIC 

This criticism is that Wollaston's system is exclusively 
intellectualistic and that it neglects the proper considera- 
tion of feeling as the real dynamic of moral action. I do 
not believe that this criticism can, with justice, be made 

""Gay, Fundamental Prins. of Virtue, Sec. V, p. 274. 

"^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. 

"2 Ibid., Sec. I, Paragraphs X and XI. 

^^Gay, Fundamental Prins. of Virtue, Sections I and II. 



Wollaston and His Critics 151 

against his system of Ethics. It is true that his criterion 
is based upon reason, rather than upon feeling, but he also 
insists that everything is to be considered. It is reasonable 
to consider happiness and other feelings, so these must go 
into the motivation of the man who is trying to do the moral 
thing and not alone the rationality of things. An objective 
standard of morals is one that is based on the nature of 
things, which is learned through experience. Moral rela- 
tions are dependent upon real relations and the moral law 
is that everything is to be treated as what it is. Feelings 
are included in this catalogue. 

In his defence of the thesis "Moral distinctions are not 
derived from reason," Hume takes occasion to criticize 
Wollaston severely as the most outstanding defender of 
the opposite thesis. He says that "there are in men's minds 
two kinds of things, namely, impressions and ideas." This 
distinction, he says, gives rise to the ethical question as to 
whether our distinctions of right and wrong, are based on 
the senses or on reason. Hume takes the position that 
philosophers, like Wollaston, affiiTn that virtue is but the 
conformity of actions to reason and that morality, like 
truth, is "discerned merely by ideas." Now, says Hume, 
"in order to judge of these systems, we need only consider 
whether it be possible, from reason alone, to distinguish 
between moral good and evil, or whether there must concur 
with some other principles to enable us to make that distinc- 
tion." He thinks that reason can indicate the means of at- 
taining a desired end, but it cannot itself determine that 
end. Reason, he further objects, is powerless to move the 
person to moral action, and "can never be the source of 
so active a principle as a conscience or a sense of morals." 
He, therefore, concludes that the principles of morality 
cannot be "conclusions of the reasons." ^^* 

Reason, Hume argues, has to do only with truth and 
truth consists of agreement or disagreement of ideas to 
ideas and to real existence. Now, actions and volitions can 
have no such relations " 'Tis impossible, therefore, they 
can be pronounced either true or false, and be either con- 
"* Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, pp. 413-18 and 456-7. 



152 The Ethics pf William Wollaston 

trary or conformable to reason." ^^^ Literally speaking, he 
is right, and Wollaston agrees with him on that point. As 
has been shown, at length, Wollaston does not identify 
morality and truth, but just takes the position that morality 
is conformity of life to the real nature of things and is as 
true as is the conformity of thought to the real nature of 
things. ^^^ Hume goes on to say that: "Actions do not 
derive their merit, nor their blame from a contrariety to 
it. Moral distinctions are not the offspring of reason." ^^^ 
He says that reason alone is not sufficient to offer either 
moral blame or approbation. The reason can only judge 
between a question of fact or of relations and there is a 
great difference between a question of fact and one of right. 
He takes as an example, a case of ingratitude, and asks 
how it can be shown by reason alone that ingratitude is im- 
moral and "wherein the crime consists?" ^^^ Wollaston 
might very easily ask Hume how he is to show "wherein the 
crime consists" by any faculty other than that of reason, 
for Hume grants that only the reason is capable of judging 
facts and relations. 

He tries, further, to show the impotency of reason as a 
moral guide, by saying that "there is the same contrariety 
in returning good for evil as in returning evil for good, and 
yet the moral aspect is entirely different." This means, he 
thinks, that moral distinctions cannot rest on the reason, 
but they must depend "on some internal sense or feeling 
which nature has made universal in the whole species. -"^^^ 
Wollaston has an entire division devoted to answering this 
very objection. He says that it is absolutely necessary to 
consider a thing in all its relations before we can pass a 
correct moral judgment. He takes the case of riding a 
stolen horse. A man who rides a stolen horse both conforms 
to reality and violates the nature of things. So, Wollaston 
savs, that a consideration of all relations would show that 
returning good for evil conforms to the larger relations and 

^^ Ibid., p. 457. 

^«« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 

"' Ibid., p. 458. 

^^ Hume, Treatise on Human Nature, p. 458. 

*^ Hume, Inquiry Concerning the Prins. of Morals, App., Sec. I. 



Wollaston and His Critics 153 

so is conformable to the bigger truth and the more impor- 
tant natures and relations. ^^^ There is, this principle would 
admit, some contrariety in returning good for evil, but in 
the returning of evil for good one acts contrary to the larger 
truth, one acts in violation of the more essential life rela- 
tions. 

Wollaston anticipates this criticism of Hume in his case 
of a man treating an enemy as an enemy. He says "If 
everything must be treated as being what it is, what rare 
work will follow? For to treat my enemy as such is to 
kill him, or revenge myself soundly upon him. . . . To this 
it is easy to reply from what has been already said. For if 
. . . the enemy . . . was nothing more than an enemy, 
there might be some force to the objection; but since he 
may be considered as something else besides that, he must 
be used according to what he is in other respects, as well 
as in that from which he is denominated my enemy. For 
my enemy in the first place is a man ; and as such may claim 
the benefit of common humanity." Not only is he a man 
and so demanding to be treated as such but he is also a 
citizen and so as such should not be punished without due 
process of law. If truth, therefore, be observed, the result 
will be this "I must treat" my enemy "as something com- 
pounded of a man, a fellow-citizen, and an enemy, all three; 
that is I must only prosecute him in such a way, as is agree- 
able to the statutes and methods, which society" has estab- 
lished.i^i 

Blakey says that Wollaston^s principle, that when a man 
acts virtuously his actions are in conformity with the 
nature of things, is capable of being understood in two 
ways. It may, he says, merely state that, as a matter of 
fact, the virtuous actions of mankind are in conformity 
with the nature of things. It may mean, on the other hand, 
that the ideal of moral obligations is derived from the per- 
ception of this conformity between moral actions and the 
nature of things. Blakey says that it is not at all clear 
whether Wollaston means to say that the conception of this 

i*" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 
"^Ibid., p. 24. 



154 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

conformity is the reason why men act virtuously, or merely 
the source of their notions of moral relations. He says that 
it is inconceivable, though, that the mere perception of con- 
formity between actions and things could possess the power 
to prompt one to moral action. In a word, he criticizes 
Wollaston's system on the grund that it is merely intellectual 
and consequently has no dynamic. "If I fly to the succor of 
my child in distress, can my sympathy be said to be moved, 
or my sense of duty awakened, by viewing an agreement 
between the hitherto unperformed act of rendering assist- 
ance and the nature of things? Certainly not." ^^^ 

Blakey, very properly, says that the principal part of 
Wollaston's moral theory rests upon the third proposition 
of the first section, "A true proposition may be denied, or 
things may be denied to be what they are, by deeds as well 
as by express words," but I am not at all sure that he gets 
Wollaston's point, that things may be affirmed or contra- 
dicted by practice. Blakey takes the same view as to the 
impotence of the intellect as does Hume "It shows the dif- 
ferent paths and the direction to take, but it does not choose 
one path rather than another." ^^^ Wollaston says that 
man possesses intelligence and freedom of will. It may be 
asked if Ethics has not accomplished its task when it has 
shown us what our duty is, and assured us that we are free 
to do our duty? ^^* That Wollaston is somewhat deficient 
as to the psychology of feeling and volition I would gladly 
admit, but I cannot see that that constitutes a criticism 
of his ethical criterion. The psychology of action is one 
thing, the ethics of action is quite another. The first is a 
descriptive, a matter of fact, study; the second is a study 
of norms, a study of criteria of conduct. Wollaston was 
a moralist, primarily, and was interested mainly in the 
normative study.^^^ 

The faculty of reason is impotent, says Hutcheson, "not 
being able either to justify or to condemn. Those who 

"2 Blakey, His. of Moral Science, p. 192. 
^ Ibid., p. 193. 

^»* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
"''Ibid., Sections III and IV. 



Wollaston and His Critics 155 

identify moral goodness and conformity to truth uncon- 
sciously employ the moral sense criterion." Hutcheson 
says that it is necessary to suppose that there "is a natural 
and immediate criteria of morality, a sense or instinct, for 
it is inconceivable that God should have made us so that we 
would be left at the mercy of the slow and uncertain proc- 
esses of reason." ^^^ By the use of his reason Hutcheson 
tries to prove that the reason is incompetent to decide moral 
matters and impotent to move one to act morally. He 
admits, however, that we must depend upon the reason to 
supply all the meaning and content, and to suggest all the 
means towards the attainment of the moral end.^^^ The 
question might well be asked just what function the moral 
sense or instinct performs in the moral life? It is granted 
that it is a blind guide in the sense that it must depend 
upon the ordinary knowing processes for all its knowledge 
and upon the reason for suggestions as to just what should 
be done in any given life situation. If the intellect is to 
tell us what we ought to do, if that is admitted to be a 
matter of judgment, what is the use of a power that can 
only tell us to do our duty when we find out what it is.f* 
Why not make the other a matter of reason also? Is the 
moral sense a blind giant carrying on liis back a lame in- 
tellect who can see? One certainly gets that impression 
of the moral faculty from the writings of the intuitionists. 
Wollaston thinks that no endowment is necessary to make 
one a moral being. The possession of reason, of intelligence, 
alone, is sufficient explanation. An intelligent being will 
inevitably perceive the natures and relations of things and 
his own connection therewith. He will naturally and neces- 
sarily perceive that his actions should conform to the 
natures and relations. ^^^ 

Leslie Stephen says that, in a sense, the universe is rea- 
sonable throughout. The fall of a stone is as reasonable 
as the working of a logician's brain. From this point of 
view, every conceivable event is reasonable, therefore no kind 

^^ Hutcheson, System of Moral Philosophy, pp. 56-8 and 272. 

^^ Inquiry into the Origin of Ideas of Beauty and Virtue, p. 195. 

"'Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Par. Ill, and Sec. III. 



156 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

of conduct can be considered more reasonable than any 
other. In another sense only the conduct of a being capable 
of knowing what he is doing is reasonable. "We may say 
that a man is reasonable in so far as reason controls his 
passions. And again we call a man reasonable, in propor- 
tion as he apprehends certain general principles, and as 
they affect his conduct." ^^^ Stephen says "Reasoning and 
feeling are bound together in an inseparable unity. Every 
choice is a struggle between passions involving more or less 
reasoning, but not resolvable into an emotionless process. 
Every moral struggle has, not feeling on one side and reason 
on the other, as is often supposed, but feeling and reason 
on both sides, or there could be no struggle." He says 
that the mere intellectual perception could have no effect 
on a man tempted to drink "if the sense of duty and love 
of family did not represent a strong fund of emotion 
capable of being called into vigorous operation." ^^^ Wol- 
laston would not be disposed to deny this. This would all 
be involved in a full and complete consideration of the 
natures of things. A man is, what.'' Why, in this case, the 
husband of a loving wife, etc. Even though we grant the 
impotence of the "mere intellectual perception" of what 
one ought to do, what is established thereby with reference 
to truth or conformity to the nature of things as the 
criterion of virtue? Nothing, because a criterion has per- 
formed its function when it has prescribed the appropriate 
conduct in any given life situation. 

Leslie Stephen says that reason can make anything seem 
consistent to our prejudiced minds. Perhaps so, but are 
we not even more likely to be prejudiced through feeling 
than through reason? "To give a merely formal consistency 
to my conduct, it is sufficient that this cause should become 
a reason; that the motives by which I am actually deter- 
mined should be represented in the general rules which I 
frame. If hatred to the red-haired actually influences me, 
I have only to dislike the red-haired man in theory to make 

"^ L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., p. 56. 
*'*' L. Stephen, Science of Ethics, pp. 58-66, 



Wollaston and His Critics 157 

my conduct consistent." ^^^ Wollaston would answer this 
by saying that a certain limited consistency would char- 
acterize such conduct, but that moral conduct means actions 
that are in entire conformity to the nature of things. He 
insists, in this connection, upon the necessity of considering 
things in all relations. He says that "any thing . . . must 
be considered not only ... in one respect, but . . . the 
whole description of the thing ought to be taken in." ^^^ 
Again he says "all truths are consistent, nor can anything 
be true any further than it is compatible with other things 
that are true." ^^^ It is not consistent with all life and 
world relations for me to hate the red-haired and such con- 
duct is therefore wrong. Wollaston considers this objection 
to the criterion of truth in the case of the proper treatment 
of an enemy. I do conform to a small segment of truth, 
says Wollaston, when I mistreat my enemy but I violate a 
world of truth by so doing. So to hate the red-haired I make 
my conduct consistent with a small segment of life's circle 
but it is inconsistent and immoral behavior, because 
it neglects to consider the red-haired man in all rela- 
tions.2o* 

Leslie Stephen takes a position like that of Wollaston's 
contemporary critic, John Clarke, which position is an abso- 
lute denial of the entire objective point of view in Ethics. 
They hold that the motive alone determines the morality of 
an act. John Clarke said that "in order to a person's 
affirming or denying the truth, an intention to affinn or deny 
is required, without which he cannot be said to affirm or 
deny it. . . . It matters not, what notions or propositions 
his words or actions may naturally excite in the minds of 
those that hear the one, or see the other; if he himself had 
no such propositions in his own mind, had no intentions 
of communicating any such propositions to others, he can- 
not in any propriety of language be said to affirm or deny 

^^L. Stephen, Science of Ethics, p. 66. 

"<« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 19 and 24. 

»3Ibid., p. 25. 

'o^Ibid., p. 24. 



158 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

them." ^^^ Leslie Stephen says that a man who gives to the 
poor conforms externally to the rule dictated by charity, 
but his act is not charitable unless his motives are those of 
sympathy. This proves, he thinks, that motives and not 
external conformity to the nature of things determine the 
morality of an act.^^® How would our author answer this 
objection? He would say that both right motive and con- 
formity to the situation are required to constitute an act 
completely conformable to the natures of things. Just as 
everything enters into the motivation of the act so every- 
thing enters into the evaluation of the act. Wollaston does 
not deny that motive is an important factor in the evalua- 
tion. It is true that his standard is that of conformity to 
the nature of things, that he insists that "if things are but 
fairly permitted to speak for themselves . . . they will pro- 
claim their own rectitude or obliquity"; but it is just as 
true that he insists that "That act which may be denomi- 
nated morally good or evil, must be the act of a being 
capable of distinguishing, choosing, and acting for himself; 
or more briefly of an intelligent and free agent, because in 
proper speaking no act at all can be ascribed to that, which 
is not indued with these capacities." ^*^^ Why this insist- 
ence upon intelligence if he does not regard motive as an 
all-important factor in evaluation.'^ Wollaston goes further 
and says that for an act to be a moral act "it must be the 
act of an agent" and that he must act "from an internal 
principle." ^^^ 

Irons offers the criticism that this system "attempts to 
eliminate the feeling and the will from the sphere of action, 
and moral obligation from morality." He grants that rea- 
son "is a light which guides our steps, but not the power 
which makes us move." It might be asked, if it is not the 
exclusive business of a moral standard "to guide our steps," 
to enlighten; and if this is true can rationalism in Ethics 
be said to have failed only because it is impotent to make 

2«=J. Clarke, Exam, of the Notion of Good and Evil in the "Reli. of 
Nat. Delin.," p. 9. 

^'"'L. Stephen, Science of Ethics, p. 311. 
^^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 7. 
^"sibid., p. 8. 



Wollaston and His Critics 159 

men do what they know they ought to do? But Irons next 
proceeds to criticize the system of Wollaston on the ground 
that it makes of reason not only the faculty which perceives 
moral relations, but also the impulse by means of which they 
are realized in action. ^^^ Surely Irons would not deny that 
when a man acts morally his will is guided and determined 
by intelligence. Wollaston does not deny the place of feel- 
ing and will in morality. The feeling accompanying the 
thought when we make a mere existential judgment is dif- 
ferent from that which accompanies thoughts of personal 
duty and responsibility, nevertheless it is the natures and 
relations of things which constitute the moral situation and 
the moral obligation. Yet, he would say, with Clarke, "the 
faculty which determines what things are, determines what 
ought to be." ^^^ But this does not mean the identification 
of the two processes, as Irons thinks. The position is not 
that : "The same faculty which decides in regard to the law 
of right supplies the dynamic force which is necessary for 
the realization of the law." ^^^ Clarke and Wollaston do 
not rule out feeling as the dynamic nor the fiat of the will. 
But since morality must not be individual and subjective 
and since the feelings are the idiosyncrasies of the indi- 
vidual, the criterion of morality cannot be based on the feel- 
ings. It is reason which constitutes the universal in man, 
consequently morality must be grounded on the reason.^^^ 
Morality when so conceived is objective, because the reason 
in the individual man is but the conformity of thought to 
the real nature of things. ^^^ 

Simmel takes the position that "the notion of good and 
evil is a merely subjective category, possessing no objec- 
tivity." Rashdall undertakes to refute this position. He 
asks, how can we tell that the notion of duty is not a mere 
emotion as Simmel claims? He answers, in the same way 
that I know that the judgment, six is greater than four, is 
no mere feeling. We have, says Rashdall, the same reason 

*» Irons, Rationalism in Mod. Ethics, Phil. Rv., vol. XII, p. 86. 

»" Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 86. 

^ Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Ph. Rv., vol. XII, p. 141. 

*" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 45-6. 

^ Ibid., pp. 50-1. 



160 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

for believing in the objectivity validity of moral conscious- 
ness, as we have for supposing that the proposition two 
and two make four is objectively true. The notion of duty, 
he thinks, is as inexpugnable a notion of the human mind 
as the notions of quantity or cause and we have as much 
reason to believe in the validity of our moral judgments, as 
we have for confidence in the validity of those other cate- 
gories. '* Rashdall believes that moral judgments are the 
work of reason and that there are such things as self-evident 
moral judgments. "The real ethical judgment," he says, 
"is the judgment of value which affirms that such and such 
things are good." They must come from "the rational or 
intellectual part of our nature," for they "represent one 
particular activity of the same self which gives us the funda- 
mental intellectual truths." His answer to Simmel is very 
much the same answer that Wollaston makes to that type 
of moral theory, and his idea of the moral judgment is very 
much the same as that of Wollaston, namely, the discern- 
ment of the really congruous act in any life situation.^^* 

Irons says that all purposive action is to make things 
different from what they are, consequently we could better 
define morality by saying that it is "the effort to make 
things other than they are." The question for Ethics, then 
is: what is the ideal which ought to be actualized in the 
world .^^ Irons says that reason cannot answer this question, 
consequently rationalism as the method of Ethics must be 
abandoned. It is not true that in the moral world things 
of every kind are now treated according to their true nature, 
as Irons thinks. He says that to treat everything as that 
which it is cannot be denominated moral because it is nat- 
ural to treat things in that way. He thinks that morality 
belongs to the world that ought to be, not to the world that 
is. The identification of truth and goodness would result 
in the annihilation of the ideal world, Irons thinks. This, 
Wollaston would gladly admit, but he would say that an 
intellectual system of morals need not identify the intel- 
lectual and the moral. As I have tried to show Wollaston 

*" Simmel, Einleitung in die Moralwissenschaft, vol. II, p. 347. Rash- 
dall, Is Conscience an Emotion? p. 36 ff. 



Wollaston and His Critics 161 

certainly does not identify the two. Irons says that the 
identification of the intellectual and moral would annihilate 
the ideal world, because reason deals with that which is and 
that only, so the rules of conduct prescribed by the reason 
must be limited in the same way. If we act according to 
reason alone, we must act in accordance with things as they 
are, and Wollaston, Irons says, did not hesitate to define 
the whole duty of man as treating things as they are.^^^ 

Wollaston denies that the moral ideal of truth, or that 
of acting conformably with the real natures of things, is 
the annihilation of the ideal world. The whole duty of man 
does consist in living a life every act of which is consistent 
and in conformity to the nature of things, but Wollaston 
insists that the ideal life is that kind of life. If everything 
was treated as that which it is, the world that is would be 
the world that ought to bo. If God, man, beast, bird were 
so considered, then would this world be an ideal world. It 
is certain that the ideal cannot be realized by disregarding 
the actual, but only by living truly which can only mean 
acting conformably to the natures and relations of things. 
Clarke well expresses this conception of the ideal of life by 
saying that virtue consists in considering things to be what 
they are and that vice consists in "the endeavor to make 
things to be what they are not and cannot be." ^^^ I do 
not understand this to be a static view of life and the world. 
Things may very well be different each moment and for each 
person in all the world, but things are always as they are 
and our duty as free rational beings is to be found by truly 
conforming our lives to the natures of things. Wollaston 
thus expresses it: "In view of the eternal and necessary 
relations which exist between things, reason lays an obliga- 
tion upon us; but what is this obligation.'^ simply that our 
actions be in conformity with these eternal and necessary 
relations." ^^"^ Our entire duty is, then, "that we should 
act in accordance with the nature of things." 

^' Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Rv., Vol. 12, p. 142. 

2i« Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 66. 

^^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., Sec. I, Paragraph X. 



A CRITICAL EXPOSITION OF WOLLASTON'S SEC- 
TION ON HAPPINESS 



EXPOSITION OF SECTION II "OF HAPPINESs" 

"That which demands to be next considered, is happi- 
ness ; as being in itself most considerable ; as abetting the 
cause of truth; and as being indeed so nearly allied to it, 
that they cannot well be parted. We cannot pay the 
respect due to one, unless we regard the other. Happi- 
ness must not be denied to be what it is ; and it is by the 
practice of truth that we aim at that happiness, which is 
true." Wollaston says that a being may be said to be 
happy the sum total of whose pleasures exceeds the sum 
total of his pain. "To make itself happy," Wollaston says, 
"is a duty, which every being, in proportion to its capacity, 
owes to itself; and that, which every intelligent being may 
be supposed to aim at in general." ^ This, it must be ad- 
mitted, when taken alone, reads like Hedonism. And we 
can admit that Wollaston does rank happiness very high 
among the hierarchy of the real and true things of life. 
It is not true, however, as some have thought, that he con- 
sidered happiness as the end and truth only as the means 
to that end. It is not true to his teachings to define Wol- 
laston's system as the search of happiness by the practice 
of truth. ^ Wollaston does, in the metaphysical portion 
of his treatise, profess his faith in the rationality of the 
universe and so his belief in the ultimate coincidence of 
truth and happiness ; and, from that point of view, says 
that Natural Religion may be regarded "as the pursuit of 
happiness by the practice of reason and truth." ^ This is 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 37. 
' Anon., Art. Wollaston, in Britannica. 
■Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 53. 

162 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 163 

the basis of Hurst's statement that his "creed was the pur- 
suit of happiness by the practice of reason and truth." * 

It is somewhat surprising that one who takes the intel- 
lectual attitude towards morals, as does Wollaston, should 
give so much attention to happiness. I think that the ex- 
planation is to be found partly in the historic situation, 
and partly in the fact that an objective system of morality 
must regard human happiness as of the highest importance. 
Many of his predecessors and contemporary ethical writers 
sought to find in happiness the criterion of morality. Wol- 
laston grants that the consideration is of the highest im- 
portance, but he denies that it alone can be the criterion. 
Happiness, like everything else, must be treated as what it 
is. "We cannot," says Wollaston, "act with respect to 
either ourselves, or other men, as being what we are and 
they are, unless both are considered as being susceptive of 
happiness and unhappiness." This, however, is not all that 
must be considered, as Hedonism teaches, but happiness is 
only one of the things that must be considered in treating 
men as what they are. So far from happiness being the 
ultimate criterion for him, he says, that "the true and ulti- 
mate happiness of no being can be produced by anything 
that interferes with truth, and denies the natures of things ; 
so neither can the practice of truth make any being ulti- 
mately unhappy." ^ The ultimate criterion, then, is truth 
and not happiness, for truth of every kind cannot be re- 
duced to happiness, but happiness is significant for morals 
only in so far as it is reducible to truth. So far from 
Wollaston going over to Hedonism, as some of his critics 
accuse him of doing, he compels Hedonism to come to his 
standard. There are, he says, higher and lower, true and 
false pleasures.^ 

Wollaston takes the position that to treat people "as 
being what they are" is to treat them "as beings both de- 
sirous of happiness and as requiring happiness for their self- 
realization. He goes so far as to say that: "To make it- 

* Hurst, His. of Rationalism, p. 101. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 38. 
•Ibid., p. 38. 



164 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

self happy is a duty which every being . . . owes to itself, 
and which every intelligent being aims at." While all men 
desire happiness and seek to realize it, all do not find it. 
The reason for this failure is due to the fact that their lives 
are not guided by the light of truth. Happiness, says Wol- 
laston, is closely allied to truth, and it is "by the prac- 
tice of truth" that men attain "that happiness, which is 
true." The false life cannot be a happy life, says Wollaston, 
but only that life which is lived in conformity to its own 
true self and to the real nature of things can be a happy 
life. He is especially insistent upon the fact that: "The 
happiness of every being must be something that is not in- 
compatible with ... its nature. . . . For instance, noth- 
ing can be the true happiness of a rational being, that is in- 
consistent with reason. ... If anything becomes agreeable 
to a rational being, which is not agreeable to reason, it is 
plain his reason is lost, his nature deprest, and that he now 
lifts himself among irrationals," for "a rational being can 
like nothing of that kind without a contradiction to itself. 
For to do this would be to act, as if it were the contrary of 
what it is," and "whatever interferes with reason, interferes 
with truth." ^ According to Wollaston there are two things 
that "are to be religiously regarded in all our conduct," and 
"these are met together and embrace each other." These are 
truth and happiness. Wollaston does not subordinate either 
to the other, but he does define happiness in terms of truth, 
which is the same as saying that truth is a more ultimate 
category. He says that happiness is the natural and neces- 
sary consequence of a life of truth, and consists of "such 
pleasures, as company, or follow the practice of truth, or are 
not inconsistent with it." The criterion of morality is truth 
and one can be happy only by living a life that is conform- 
able to truth. ^ 

Wollaston argues for the ultimate coincidence of happi- 
ness and truth on the ground, that "that which contradicts 
nature and truth opposes the will of the Author of nature." 
Because of the freedom he possesses as his birth-right, a 

' Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 38-9. 
« Ibid., p. 39. 



Exposition ofWollastorCs Section on Happiness 166 

finite being may act in opposition to the Divine will, and, in 
so doing, may "break through the constitution of things" or 
violate the nature of reality. He denies, however, that hap- 
piness can be attained in that way. In a consistent universe, 
he says, in effect, those who live conformably with the true 
nature of things must be ultimately happy; and those who 
live contradictory lives must be, in the long run, unhappy.^ 
Things could be otherwise only in a crazy world. In a 
consistent world the true wa}'^ of life must lead to happiness, 
so the way to trutl| and the way to happiness must be ulti- 
mately the same. /He postulates religion as the necessary 
ground of the unity of truth and happiness. An intelligible 
world must be a rational and consistent world, a world in 
which good and evil, true and false are grounded upon the 
real and ultimate nature of things. Happiness must, also, 
somehow find its true place in the scheme of things. The 
rationality shown in this cosmic unity is natural religion. 
"The way to happiness and the practice of truth incur the 
one in the other." He had, in an earlier passage, said that 
"nothing can produce the ultimate happiness of any being, 
which interferes with truth; and therefore whatever doth 
produce that, must be something which is consistent and co- 
incident with this." ^^ These two things, then, "are both to 
be religiously regarded in all our conduct. And since both 
these units unite so amicably, and are at last the same, here 
in one religion which may be called natural upon two ac- 
counts." ^^ 

Wollaston certainly did not think himself to be a Hedonist, 
not even a universalistic one, of this fact I think we can 
make sure from his own writings. He says that the im- 
mutable distinction between right and wrong is the same as 
that between true and false, that is in conformity or non- 
conformity to the real nature of things. They who say that 
goodness consists in "following nature" are correct, he says, 
if by "following nature," not the acting according to one's 
desires as the Hedonists teach, but "the acting according to 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin,., pp. 38, 40 and 15. 
" Ibid., pp. 40, 42 and 172-3. 
" Ibid., pp. 173-4. 



166 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

the natures of things," the "treating of everything as being 
what they are in nature or according to truth." Wollaston 
says that "this does not appear to be their meaning. And 
if it is only that a man must follow his own nature, since 
his nature is not purely rational, but there is a part of him, 
which he has in common with the brutes, they appoint him 
a guide which I fear will mislead him, this commonly being 
more likely to prevail, than the rational part." ^^ By fol- 
lowing nature, he in effect says, we must mean, if this for- 
mula is to serve as a criterion of virtue, not the following 
of our physical desires and appetites, which nature we have 
in common with the brutes, but the following of our higher 
and rational nature, that nature which is the peculiar endow- 
ment of man. This is certainly very far from a hedonistic 
conception of life. Pleasure and happiness, like everything 
else good and true, must get their due realization, but the 
criterion is not in the senses nor in the feelings, but in the 
reason. Wollaston, to be sure, grants that human nature 
is not purely rational, a part of his nature being like that 
of the brutes, but this animal side of man is not his essential 
nature. The essential thing about man is his reason, and 
whatever will stand the test of reason is right and that which 
will not stand that test is wrong. "Right reason" mean- 
ing that "which is found by the right use of our rational 
faculties," is "coincident with truth." ^^ 

Wollaston offers still another argument against Hedonism ; 
he says that those who undertake to define morality in terms 
of pleasure and pain end in leaving it undefined, because men 
are even more different in their ideas and tastes as to what 
constitutes happiness than as to what constitutes the good. 
"As men have different tastes, different degrees of sense 
and philosophy, the same thing cannot be pleasant to all; 
and if particular actions are to be proved by this test, 
the morality of them will be very uncertain; the same 
act may be of one nature to one man, and of another to an- 
other." He goes further and says that "unless there be 
some limitation added as a fence for virtue, men will sink 

12 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 22. 
" Ibid., p. 33. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 167 

into gross voluptuousness, as in fact the generality of Epi- 
curus' herd have done (notwithstanding all his talk of tem- 
perance, virtue, tranquillity of mind, etc.)." He then pro- 
poses a "limitation as a fence for virtue. For not all pleas- 
ures, but only such pleasures as are true, or happiness, may 
be reckoned among the fines, or ultima bonorum." ^"^ Bishop 
Butler in commenting upon this passage, has this to say: 
"A late author of great and deserved reputation says, that 
to place virtue in following nature, is at least a loose way to 
talk. And he has reason to say this, if what I think he in- 
tends to express be true, that scarce any other sense can be 
put upon these words, but acting as any of the several parts, 
without distinction, of a man's nature, happened most to 
incline him." ^^ 

A rather strong case can be made against Wollaston on 
the charge of Hedonism, and I have no disposition to evade 
the charge. The charge takes about this form. Wollaston 
does say that the criterion of morality is truth or conformity 
to reality. But, when he is asked, what truth must be con- 
formed to, to constitute virtue? he is compelled to answer, 
truths concerning personality. And when he is pushed back 
still further and asked, but how, in particular, can one con- 
tradict the nature of personality or conform to the nature 
of personality .f* he has, practically, said that we must be- 
have in such a way as to promote human happiness. One 
cannot be said to be living true, w^hen he is promoting human 
misery. The case mentioned by Wollaston of failing to go 
to the assistance of a man grevously hurt is a case in point ; 
after saying that by so acting, one denies "human nature 
to be what it is," he then, to all appearance, explicates his 
meaning in terms of Hedonism. He, who so treats a human 
being, thereby denies "those desires and expectations, which 
I am conscious to myself I should have under the like misfor- 
tune, to be what they are." ^^ The same resort to Hedonism 
is made when Wollaston wishes to explain degrees of crime. 
It is true that he says that immorality consists in the viola- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 24. 

" Butler, Preface to Sermons. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 



168 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

tions of truth, but when he tries to explain these violations 
of truth in concrete human terms, it appears that it is hu- 
man happiness which is violated. The one who steals a book 
deprives the proprietor of happiness. "It is true A is 
guilty of a crime in not treating the book as being what it 
is, the book of B, whose happiness partly depends upon it ; 
but still if A should deprive B of a good estate he would be 
guilty of a much greater crime." Why? Because of the 
greater happiness accruing to B from the estate than from 
the book. Wollaston, though, takes the position that hap- 
piness violated is just truth violated, and so makes his ulti- 
mate criterion not happiness but truth. ^"^ 

There is a notion held by some moralists that a purely 
intellectual system of ethics will be absolutely abstract, and 
consequently entirely unrelated to the actual world of lives 
among which we live. This has certainly characterized the 
intuitional intellectualism in morals. A proper evalua- 
tion of happiness, it is said, relates morals more closely to 
real life. I think that there is considerable truth in this 
contention. Certainly a view of ethics that entirely disre- 
garded such an important human consideration can be no 
true guide to life. In fact those who interpret Wollaston 
intuitionally say that he would have one conform to the 
absolute truth, regardless of all human consequences. They 
mention especially his hesitancy to tell a lie, even to save a 
life.18 

Now, one can take a position that considers happiness of 
the very highest importance without going over to Hedon- 
ism. It is possible to treat happiness purely objectively, 
and when so considered it is evaluated according to the 
criterion of truth just as other life values. I think that Car- 
neri is correct in thinking that Wollaston truly harmonized 
truth and happiness. He says that "the sensualistic prin- 
ciple . . . lent . . . the weight of experience or at least 
never permitted Wollaston to lose himself in metaphysical 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 91. 

^^Ibid. Bott, Refutation of "The Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 20. J. 
Clarke, Examination of "The Reli. of Nat. Delin.," p. 61. Wollaston, 
Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 27. 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 169 

flights." Carneri characterizes his ethics as "realistic" or 
objective. It was rationalistic in the sense that the nature 
of morality was "deduced not from a specific impulse of the 
individual, but from the fitness of things." It was not, how- 
ever, rationalistic in the sense that human feelings were dis- 
regarded. There results from the life lived "conformably 
with the nature of things ... a general harmony for the 
individual." He says that Wollaston determined the good, 
not abstractly but in view of "the results" that may natur- 
ally be expected. So the good, he came to regard, as that 
which can be expected to lead to the happiness and well be- 
ing of the individual and of society. Carneri very truly says, 
that this placing of "the mark of the good on an objective 
basis (das Markmal des Guten in die Objectivitat)" neces- 
sarily had the "fruitful result of reinterpreting truth." 
When speaking morally, anyway, truth must mean not just 
"abstract coherency (Zusammenhang)" but real human de- 
sires and life relations, that is die Wahrheit must also be 
thought of objectively.^^ 

Windelband says that in order for Wollaston to prove 
that actions which have "diese logische Richtigkeit . . . 
nothwendig auch zur Gliickseligkeit fiihren," he must sub- 
stitute for his abstract logical criterion, which is purely in- 
tellectual, Clarke's idea of "fitness." I do not feel this dif- 
ference between the two systems. I think that Wollaston's 
system is as objective as is Clarke's. Wollaston says that 
morality is acting in conformity to the nature and relations 
of things. It is simply being as true in action as in thought. 
Clarke, it seems to me, just used somewhat different lan- 
guage to express the same general meaning. He says that 
the moral act is the fitting act. In one place in Wollaston's 
work he used Clarke's term.^^ Windelband says that in 
order to prove that the moral act which is in agreement with 
truth, i. e., "has a correct logical content," also leads to 
happiness one must show "how the treatment of relations, 
which rest on a correct knowledge of the same, brings about 

^® Carneri, Grundlegung der Ethik, p. 407. 

2« Windelband, Gesch. der Neuen Phil., vol. I, p. 266. Wollaston, Reli. 
of Nat. Delin., p. 43. Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 45. 



170 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

for the agent a favorable form of the same." This does not 
seem to me to be true. Why can we not believe, with Wollas- 
ton, that happiness really ought to be the result of a life of 
truth and that it would really be the most contradictory 
thing conceivable for it to result otherwise ? Just as it would 
be inconceivable for morality to be contradictory to truth 
and reality, so also is it inconceivable for goodness and truth 
not to lead to happiness. ^^ 

Gass interprets Wollaston as meaning that a life of truth 
leads necessarily to happiness. The life of conformity to 
the true nature of things ought to result in happiness, for it 
would not be according to the nature of things for it to re- 
sult otherwise. It would be unfitting for a good life to 
result in unhappiness. Gass says that the "appropriateness 
recommends itself through itself (das Wohlbemessene emp- 
fiehlt sich durch sich selbst). It makes the impression of the 
fitting, . . . and through its rule it guarantees also happi- 
ness (verbiirgt durch seine Herrschaft auch die Gliickselig- 
keit)." I understand Gass to say that Wollaston teaches 
that the life of truth is to be lived, not primarily, because 
it leads to happiness but because it is appropriate and fit- 
ting. He very truly says, however, that Wollaston does 
teach that the true life will be happy. He goes so far as to 
say, as we will see later, that the next life must make right 
the contradictions of this.^^ 

Noack also interprets Wollaston's system as an effort to 
reconcile the inclinations and the reason. Happiness is not 
to be thought of as an additional principle, thinks Noack, 
but instead he understands Wollaston to teach that "with 
the moral purpose of the truth that of happiness coincides" 
for happiness is nothing but "the sum of true pleasures." 
In other words, he says, that Wollaston insists that happi- 
ness is to be treated just as we treat other things and that 
it is to be similarly evaluated according to its true place and 
purpose in life. "A being is to be pronounced happy to the 

^ Windelband, Gesch. der Neuen Phil., vol. I, p. 267. Wollaston, Reli. 
of Nat. Delin., pp. 38-9 and 43. 

" Gass, Gesch. der Christlichen Ethik, p. 19. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., pp. 72 and 113-14. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 171 

extent that its pleasures are true. ... A rational being 
cannot find happiness in irrational pleasures without con- 
tradiction; therefore only that makes man happy which is 
in accord with reason. Therefore the way to happiness and 
the realization of truth blend, and it is therefore the duty 
of every being to strive honestly after the realization of rea- 
son (aiifrichtig nach der ausiibung der Vernunft zu stre- 
ben)." This should be done for there is no other way to 
realize either goodness, truth or happiness, except through 
a life lived conformably to reason, both in theoretical and in 
practical matters. ^^ 

II 

AN EXAMINATION OF THE HEDONISTIC INTERPRETATION OF 

WOLIiASTON 

I think that there is far more ground for the criticism 
that Wollaston's system is, in the last analysis, hedonistic 
than for any of the other objections that have been offered 
to his ethical philosophy. He certainly reacted very strongly 
against the asceticism and rigorism that have generally char- 
acterized rationalistic ethics, but the question is, did he 
go over to the other extreme, — that of Hedonism? Many 
think that he did. 

The writer of the unsigned article in the Britannica on 
Wollaston goes so far as to say that he subordinated truth 
to happiness. "Wollaston starts with the assumption that 
religion and morality are identical and labors to show that 
religion is the pursuit of happiness by the practice of truth 
and reason.^* He then proceeds to say, continues the ar- 
ticle, that moral evil is the practical denial of a true propo- 
sition, and moral good the affirmation of it. The article 
makes it very clear that Wollaston discusses the nature of 
good and evil, primarily, because to be happy a man must 

^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 38-9. Noack, Geschichtliches 
Lexikon der Philosophic, p. 931. 

^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 43-4 and 52. Anon., Art. Wol- 
laston, in Britan. 



172 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

pursue the one and avoid the other. Truth and goodness 
must be practiced because these are the necessary precondi- 
tions of happiness, which is for Wollaston the goal of life. 
Granting this to be a true interpretation, it is not, truly 
speaking, a hedonistic interpretation of morality for the 
criterion, even though it be but instrumental, is not feeling 
but truth. Happiness is, to be sure, thought to be the end 
of life but it is given an objective signification. The goal of 
life is happiness but to attain happiness one must be good. 
The way to be good is to conform one's life to the truth, 
which means living conforaiably with the real nature and 
relations of things, or "treating everything as that which it 
is." ^^ I think that it can be shown from Wollaston's own 
writing that he makes truth the real end of life rather than 
happiness, and that he considers happiness one of the 
things which should be sought, both for ourselves and for 
others, because it is one of the true goods of life.^^ "There 
are," he says, "some ends which the nature of things and 
truth require us to aim at, and at which therefore if we do 
not aim, nature and truth are denied. If a man does not 
desire to prevent evils, and to be happy, he denies both his 
own nature and the nature of happiness to be what they are. 
And then further, willingly to neglect the means, leading to 
such an end, is the same as not to propose the end, and must 
fall under the same censure." ^^ I understand Wollaston 
to be saying in this passage, and this passage is truly repre- 
sentative of his position, that it is our duty to be happy 
and that it is wrong not to seek our own happiness, but I do 
not understand him to say that this is the only goal of life, 
and that happiness should be sought at the expense and to 
the exclusion of other true things of life. 

Hurst says that Wollaston's "creed was the pursuit of 
happiness by the practice of reason and truth," but he does 
not stop here but goes on and gives this an extreme interpre- 
tation, namely, that "he was the Epicurean of the system 
which he adopted." This, as we have seen, is an entirely 

25 Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 8, 13, 38-9, and 43-4. 

^Ibid., pp. 40-2. 

2' Ibid., p. 18. Anon., Art. Wollaston, in Britan. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 173 

wrong interpretation of that passage, because Wollaston 
is here discussing the ultimate coincidence of truth and hap- 
piness. In this sense, namely, from the point of view of 
eternity he can define Natural Religion "as the pursuit of 
happiness by the practice of reason and truth." ^'* Bent- 
ham interprets the ethics of Wollaston in the same way as 
does Hurst. He reduces the extreme intellectualism of Wol- 
laston to nothing but the necessary means to the getting of 
happiness. "We have," says Bentham, "one philosopher, 
who says that there is no harm in anything in the world but 
in telling a lie ; and that if, for example, you were to murder 
your own father, this would only be a particular way of 
saying, he was not your father. Of course, when this phil- 
osopher sees anything that he does not like, he says, it is a 
particular way of telling a lie. It is saying, that the act 
ought to be done, when, in truth, it ought not to be done." 
Bentham thinks that all systems of ethics appeal, in the 
last analysis, to the principle of happiness, so, quite natur- 
ally, he makes of Wollaston's intellectualism the mere rules 
for the attainment of happiness, the one thing desirable in 
life. Things other than happiness may be sought but only as 
means to the attainment of happiness. Wollaston was an 
exceedingly wise calculator, but, nevertheless, he was a hed- 
onist, a seeker of happiness and that only. In commenting on 
Wollaston's notion of morality as conformity to nature, he 
says : "To say that an act is unnatural or repugnant to 
nature means, ultimately, that I do not like it. It is, there- 
fore, repugnant to what ought to be the nature of everybody 
else." ^^ Very similar to that of Hurst and Bentham is the 
interpretation of La Rossignol. He says that for Wollas- 
ton: "Happiness is the ethical end, and virtue the means 
to it." This estimation of Wollaston gives the impression 
that he considered virtue only instrumental, that he would 
advocate virtue only when it seemed the necessary means to 
happiness ; or, at least, that he does not teach that men 
ought to live virtuously for any other reason than that a 

^ Hurst, His. of Rationalism, p. 101. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., 
p. 52. 
*® Bentham, Principles of Morals in British Moralists, p. 348. 



174 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

life of virtue is the necessary pre-condition of a life of hap- 
piness. " 

John Brown^s interpretation is very much the same as 
those I have just considered. He tries to convict Wollaston 
of Hedonism: "In every instance that Wollaston brings, 
the happiness of man is the single end to which his rule of 
truth verges in an unvaried manner." Brown undertakes to 
prove that Wollaston really made the differentia of virtue 
and vice, not truth but pleasure, and as a proof of this he 
considers WoUaston's own case of talking to a post. "He 
considered," says Brown, "the talking to a post as an ab- 
surdity," but "he is far from condemning it as an immoral 
action." Why did Wollaston consider talking to a post 
absurd but not immoral, he asks, if conformity to the nature 
of things is his real criterion of morality "for certainly one 
who talks to a post is far from conforming his actions to 
the nature of things"? Brown says that in the very same 
passage in which Wollaston discusses talking to a post he 
gives an instance of the violation of moral truth. In giving 
this instance he has, says Brown, recourse to man, "and 
not only so but to the happiness of man" as the only possible 
kind of case of the violation of moral truth. He says that 
the only reason Wollaston gives for saying that it is morally 
wrong to treat a man as a post and not wrong to treat a 
post as a man is that a man is capable of happiness while 
a post is not. Brown claims, further, that Wollaston judges 
truth entirely by the standard of happiness, proving it to 
be, in his estimation, a more ultimate moral principle than 
that of truth. "And I would gladly know," Wollaston asks, 
"how one truth can be more important than another, unless 
upon this principle, and in reference to the production of 
happiness." (This supposed quotation is not found in 
Wollaston.) Brown goes on to say that "Wollaston, indeed, 
confirms his interpretation when he speaks as follows: The 
truth violated in the former case was, B had a property in 
that, which gave him such a degree of happiness ; that vio- 
lated in the later was a greater violation ... in that it 
gave him a happiness vastly superior to the other. The vio- 
'"La Rossignol, Ethical Philosophy of Samuel Clarke, p. 88. 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 175 

lation therefore in the later case, upon this account, Is a 
vastly greater violation than in the former." ^^ I under- 
stand Wollaston's position to be that happiness is a real 
aspect of true personality and so persons can be violated in 
that way, but equally so by the violation of anything per- 
taining to persons. Wollaston says that when he speaks 
of acts inconsistent with truth he means any truth whatso- 
ever : "I would have everything taken to be what in fact and 
truth it is." Elsewhere, however, he says, that there are 
degrees of good and evil dependent upon and determined by 
the importance of the truth violated. But, asks his hedonis- 
tic critics, what determines this importance .^^ and they are 
very sure that he is compelled to answer that human happi- 
ness is the measure of the importance of truth. Wollastor 
does say that it is worse to steal an estate than a book, 
because the owner of the estate is deprived of more happ: 
ness. In a sense he may be said also to anticipate Utili 
tarianism, in this instance, for he says that not only the mai 
himself but also his family, his descendents, will be deprived 
of happiness if he is deprived of an estate, whereas the depri- 
vation in case of the book is a trifling matter in comparison. 
It seems to me, however, that Wollaston's position in these 
cases where happiness is specifically mentioned as suffering 
violation is really that nature, reality, personality is vio- 
lated.^^ Albee says, in this connection, that "Wollaston 
professed to vindicate the absolute character of virtue . . . 
really introduced hedonistic considerations at the crucial 
point." ^^ There is considerable ground for this estimation 
of his philosophy. In reply, however, we can say that there 
is just as much reason to say that, in the last analysis. 
Hedonism "introduced" other "considerations at the crucial 
point." I refer particularly to the qualitative distinctions 
between pleasures, implying a criterion other than that of 
pleasure. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 23, 20 and 172-3. Brown, Es- 
says on the Characteristics, pp. 172-3. 
2» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 21. 
^ Albee, His. of English Utilitarianism, p. 84. 



176 The Ethics of William Wollaston 



III 

AN EXAMINATION OF THE UTILITARIAN INTERPRETATION OF 

WOLLASTON 

The only objection that I have to classifying Wollaston 
as a utilitarian is the historic identification of Utilitarianism 
with Universalistic Hedonism. It is true that John Stuart 
Mill's principle, "the greatest good of the greatest number,'* 
is a fair statement of WoUaston's ethical ideal. In order, 
however, for this to serve as his formula it must be given a 
very decided objective interpretation and it must be abso- 
lutely divorced from Psychological Hedonism. Mill, and 
this has been true of the utilitarians generally, uses the 
formula "the greatest good of the greatest number" inter- 
changeably with the formula "the greatest happiness of the 
greatest number." Wollaston does not identify the two 
meanings but would subsume happiness under the other as 
a case of something which makes for human welfare. But 
more important than this is the other difference, namely, 
their very different attitudes towards happiness itself. Mill 
makes a great advance over his predecessors in that he 
universalized happiness, but it is also true that he never 
disconnected his system from that of Psychological Hedon- 
ism. In fact he still holds to Psychological Hedonism and 
starts from it as a self-evident fact. He says that the only 
reason why everyone should seek to realize "the greatest 
happiness of the greatest number" is, because each one does, 
as a matter of fact, desire his own happiness. ^^ Wollaston 
makes a great deal of happiness but he thinks of it as an 
objective good that should be sought for ourselves and for 
all men. He thinks of happiness as being an effect of true 
living, but he thinks that we should plan with reference to 
happiness in so far as we can anticipate. He would agree 
with Clarke that actions are only good or evil according 
as they tend to the benefit or disadvantage of all men. 
Lines of conduct that result in human misery can be de- 

»* J. S. Mill, Utilitarianism, chap. IV. Bradley, Ethical Studies, p. 103. 
Sidgwick's Method of Ethics, Bk. Ill, chap. XIII, p. 3. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 177 

nominated bad, and those that make for human happiness 
are good. But Wollaston says that this is only saying that 
in treating things according to their natures, in acting con- 
formably with the real nature of things, that above all else 
human beings should be considered, and that this means 
looking out for their happiness and their welf are.^^ 

In discussing moral laws and natural relations Selby-Bigge 
has a line of argument by which he thinks he proves that 
Wollaston's intellectual principle of evaluating conduct re- 
duces finally to Utilitarianism. It is possible to show "that 
immoral action is absurd" in the sense that it defeats "its 
own end," in that it commits the "material absurdity" of 
"seeking satisfaction in pursuits which cannot afford it." 
Wollaston uses "material absurdity as a test of vice," says 
Selby-Bigge. "It appears as the absurdity of treating 
things as other than they are, the absurdity of treating 
men as brutes and brutes as stones, of ignoring the natures 
of things. . . . This line of argument . . . leads easily into 
Utilitarianism, for to treat men as they are is to treat them 
primarily as capable of happiness." ^^ Taking Wollaston's 
entire system into consideration this only means that man's 
real nature and happiness and the good of society must be 
considered as things essentially real and so deserving of 
realization. I cannot see that this is going over to Utili- 
tarianism, for treating men as men, as creatures desiring 
and capable of happiness is but conforming to an aspect of 
their nature, or treating them as what they are. What Wol- 
laston really does is to treat men not as creatures capable 
of desiring happiness and as that only, but he treats them as 
that and treats happiness as one essential aspect of man's 
nature.^^ 

Leslie Stephen says that "Wollaston slides into Utili- 
tarianism." From the bare formula that "what is, is,'^ and 
as necessarily following from that that everything should 
be treated accordingly; he passes to the statement "that 

»" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 40-2. Clarke, Nat. Reli. in 
British Moralists, 524. 

*» Selby-Bigge, British Moralists, pp. XXXI-II. Wollaston, Reli. of 
Nat. Delin., pp. 24 and 38. 

^^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 37-9. 



178 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

happiness must not be denied to be what it is." ^^ He goes 
still further towards Utilitarianism, thinks Leslie Stephen, 
when he says "it is by the practice of truth that we arrive 
at that happiness which is true." ^^ I do not think that he 
makes good the accusation that Wollaston finally resorts to 
Utilitarianism for his ultimate principle of morality. It 
seems to me that what he really proves is that Wollaston ex- 
tends the principle of truth to include happiness. His quo- 
tations from Wollaston prove that he makes truth the cri- 
terion of morality, and since true happiness is a desirable 
human state that it should be sought as anything else that 
is true and in conformity to the nature of things. ^^ 

In one passage Erdmann gives Wollaston an interpreta- 
tion that would be denominated utilitarian. "He proceeds 
to the consideration of mankind and after he has designated 
happiness as the purpose of the society of mankind, also 
as the purpose of the living together of people in general, he 
deducts therefrom the law that nothing must happen which 
disturbs the happiness of other people, but then it is finally 
not only a privilege to further one's own happiness, but a 
duty, since the neglect of the same involves the proposition 
that happiness is not happiness." Erdmann is right in say- 
ing that Wollaston ranks happiness very high, but I do 
not think that we can say that he considered it the purpose 
of human society.*^ 

Historically, intellectualism in morals in England has 
been largely of the intuitional type. For this reason Sidg- 
wick says the other school triumphed. Because intuitional 
methods were discredited the emotional view of morals be- 
came popular, with the result that duty lost its objectivity 
and morality became a subjective matter. "Only after the 
extreme position to which Hume finally carried this view, 
was its dangerous character perceived and also the neces- 
sity of bringing into prominence again the cognitive element 
in moral consciousness." Sidgwick thinks Wollaston signifi- 

"L. Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. II, p. 10. 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 53. 

*» Ibid., pp. 39-40. 

** Erdmann, Gesch. der Neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 122. 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 179 

cant in that he duly considered the objective side of morals 
and the intellect as the moral faculty. "Rightness and 
wrongness," he says, "must be made dependent upon certain 
general characteristics of the action, agent and circum- 
stances ; and accordingly that the moral truth apprehended 
must be essentially universal, though particular in our ap- 
prehension of it." *^ He says in another passage that 
"WoUaston sought to exhibit the more fundamental of 
the received rules as axioms of perfect self-evidence, neces- 
sarily forced upon the mind in contemplating human be- 
ings in their relations, but WoUaston also took the position 
that the results of actions, in so far as they can be antici- 
pated, are to be considered and constitute important facts in 
the motivation. ^^ It is this consideration of results of ac- 
tions that make his system objective. The most important 
result that can be anticipated and that consequently enters 
into the motivation is happiness. Considering happiness as 
one of the results of actions to be taken into consideration, 
is very different from psychological Hedonism, which takes 
the position that the action is determined by feeling. Wol- 
laston's position, then, is really rationalistic and objective 
for he considers everything.^* 

Wollaston's attempt to consider all sides of life and to 
make ethics objective, by insisting that happiness or unhap- 
piness as the probable result of an action must enter into 
the motivation, was misunderstood from the very first. Bott, 
a contemporary of his, thinks that Wollaston is forced to 
desert the standard of truth, which he started out to main- 
tain, and to accept in its stead the standard of happiness. 
He thinks that Wollaston resorts to Hedonism, because there 
is no other way by which the importance of truths can be 
estimated. That which most promotes human happiness is 
the most important. Wollaston thinks that this is only 
applying the criterion of truth to all of life, but this is not 
Bott's interpretation. After considering Wollaston's intel- 

^^Sidgwick, Method of Ethics, pp. 100-^. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., p. 19. 

^Sidgwick, Method of Ethics, pp. 100-4. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., pp. 11, 14, and 19. 

** Ibid., pp. 38-9. 



180 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

lectual criterion, he says, that "it is observable that he does 
not always keep strictly to his definition." He is, says 
Bott, occasionally "forced ... to vary his notion of mo- 
rality; and to consider truth, not merely as truth, but ac- 
cording to the importance of it, or its influence upon the state 
and circumstances of men." '^^ Wollaston goes so far 
towards Hedonism as to define "Natural Religion to be the 
pursuit of happiness, by the practice of reason and truth." ^^ 
In another passage, says Bott, Wollaston says "I have 
shown in what the nature of moral good and evil consists, 
namely, a conformity or disagreement to truth, and those 
things that are coincident with it, reason and happiness." ^^ 
Bott interprets these passages to mean that Wollaston "takes 
into his notion of morality, not only the practice of truth, 
but also the influence of that truth upon the welfare and 
happiness of mankind. So that morality, according to him, 
is the practice of such reason and truth, as will have an in- 
fluence upon human happiness." He says "if there be any 
such truth, as in its nature has no influence this way, nor 
can have any, it has nothing to do with morality." ** Bott 
is disposed to accept this view of morality as true, but 
he does not see how Wollaston can reconcile it with his 
criterion of truth.^^ This reconciliation, Wollaston seeks 
to effect, by saying that it is true human happiness and true 
human welfare that constitutes the most important of all 
truths. It is this that constitutes the standard "by which 
the importance of truths ought to be measured." ^^ 

Wollaston agrees entirely with Bott that all other truths, 
except those related to human life are, morally speaking, 
relatively unimportant. It by no means follows from this 
that truth is not his ultimate criterion, for his treatment of 
happiness is objective. This fact Bott entirely overlooks. 
It is very significant because when happiness is considered 

^'Bott, Defence of WoUaston's Notion of Good and Evil, p. 6. 

« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 52. 

« Ibid., p. 65. 

« Ibid., pp. 40-42. 

* Bott, Defence of WoUaston's Notion of Good and Evil, p. 7. 

"Ibid., p. 16. 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 181 

objectively it becomes an object of knowledge and a relation 
to be considered. Bott's failure to understand Wollaston 
is due to the fact that he thinks Wollaston means by con- 
formity to truth, conformity to purely abstract formal 
truth. That this is by no means the case is proven by his 
many illustrations. Wollaston uses abstract propositions 
only as representative of values innumerable. There could, 
of course, be no real conformity to mere abstract truth, ex- 
cept in a formal way, for such truths have no factual exist- 
ence and morality must be acts conformable to the facts of 
the universe. Wollaston would agree entirely with what 
Bott says about the writing pen. "Indeed, let a truth be 
ever so trifling, e. g., that the pen I am writing with is four 
inches long; if I know it, and yet assert it is but three, I 
am guilty of an immorality: why? Not because I offend 
against truth, or assert what is really false, but because I 
assert what I think or know to be false; and so am guilty of 
such an act, as tends to breed distrust and uneasiness. That 
this is the true reason and not the other is evident; because 
the guilt would be the same, if, though the pen were really 
four inches long, I, through a mistake, thought it was but 
three, and yet asserted it was four." ^^ This simply means, 
from our author's point of view, that one must above all else 
be true to human relations, the most important of all truths. 
Bott is not true to the facts when he says that one does not 
offend against truth when he wills to deceive unless the state- 
ment made is contrary to fact. "An act which tends to breed 
distrust and uneasiness" is false to human relations, morally 
speaking the all-important thing. After saying what he does 
about even "trifling" truths being respected, Bott ought to 
appreciate Wollaston's hesitation to advocate a lie, for 
lying tends to disrupt human relations and to reduce the 
world to a chaos. ^^ 

I think that Bott's view of Ethics was essentially the 
same as that of Wollaston, I mean as to the naturalness of 
morality and as to the ultimate coincidence of truth, good- 

*** Bott, Examination of Wollaston's Notion of Good and Evil, pp. 7-8. 
"•Ibid., p. 8. 



182 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

ness and happiness. In proof of this I wish to call atten- 
tion to the contents of his chief work: "An Answer to thft 
Rev. Mr. Warbuton's Divine Legation, &c.," in which he cen- 
sures Warburton for making morality dependent upon the 
command of a superior being. There is also an extant ser- 
mon of his called, "Morality Founded in the Reason of 
Things." 

John Clarke, a contemporary of Bott, makes a similar 
criticism of the position of Wollaston. He, too, thinks that 
Wollaston finally resorts to happiness because the intellectual 
criterion is inadequate. He says that "the practice of 
truth, or conduct conformable to truth" can be recom- 
mended, not as a thing desirable in and for itself, without 
reference to aught else, but only as a means for the attain- 
ing of happiness. This conformity to truth," Clarke admits* 
to be "the way to happiness, the true end of life. He says 
that Wollaston, however inconsistently, came finally to this 
view. He says that this is proven by his own case of seek- 
ing to determine the difference of crime between stealing a 
book and an estate. The importance of the truth violated 
he makes to depend upon how much or how little "they con- 
duce to happiness." So he says that Wollaston comes to 
the view that conformity to truth receives its value and im- 
portance from its tendency to produce happiness. ^^ So 
Wollaston must finally grant, says John Clarke, "that what 
has in its nature, a tendency to promote the well being and 
happiness of mankind, is morally good, and what has a con- 
trary tendency, morally evil." ^* 

John Clarke says "supposing every immoral action, and 
none but such, did interfere with, or imply a denial of truth, 
. . . then indeed the interfering with or denying truth 
would be a certain criterion, whereby to distinguish immoral 
actions from what is not so; but still the nature of immo- 
rality . . . would not consist of that denial, but something 
else; for if it did, the degrees too of moral evil would de- 
pend upon that only." There would, on that assumption, be 
a concomitant variation between immorality of acts and 

•^ J. Clarke, Exami. of Wollaston's Notion of Good and Evil, pp. 51-2. 
"Ibid., p. 54. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 183 

the number of truths denied, which is not true. This proves 
that the criterion of morality is not that of conformity to 
truth.^^ Wollaston uses the method of concomitant varia- 
tion; but, he, inadvertently, proved thereby, that the real 
criterion of morality is happiness rather than truth. Wol- 
laston does not pretend, says Clarke, to determine the degrees 
of morality by the number of truths affirmed nor the degrees 
of immorality "by the number of truths violated, which he 
ought to have done, did immorality consist barely and pre- 
cisely in the violation of truth, as he affirms when he tells 
us, that the idea and formal ratio of moral evil consists in 
acting a lie.^^ He has thought fit to take in the importance 
of truths violated as well as number.^'^ The degrees of evil 
. . . are as the importance and number of truths vio- 
lated." ^^ The importance of truths is determined by the 
principle of happiness. Clarke takes Wollaston to task for 
saying that "all denial of truth , . . is . . . immoral." 
This means that happiness becomes the real criterion, be- 
cause it alone can determine the importance of the truths 
conformed to, or violated. ^^ There is no immorality in vio- 
lating many truths, but only those conducive to human 
happiness. There are cases, says Clarke, when the moral 
principle of the happiness of mankind demands that we 
violate truth. Like Bott he makes a great deal of Wol- 
laston's hesitation to violate truth for even humanity's 
sake.^^ As a matter of fact his position is that "an abuse 
of language is allowable" in such extreme cases. He says 
"all sins against truth are not equal, and certainly a little 
trespassing upon it in the present case," a case of saving 
a man from a murderer, "for the good of all parties" is 
"as little a one as any." ^^ 

"J. Clarke, Exami. of WoUaston's Notion of Gk>od and Evil, p. 56. 
Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 31. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 138. 
" Ibid., p. 22. 

"J. Clarke, Examination of WoUaston's Notion of Good, p. 59. 
" Ibid., pp. 60-3. 

""Ibid., p. 51. Bott, Consideration of WoUaston's Notion, p. 21. 
•^ Wollaston, ReU. of Nat. DeUn., p. 27. 



184 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

■\ _ • 

IV 

AN EXAMINATION OF THE DUALISTIC INTERPRETATION OF 

WOLLASTON 

Some of the critics of Wollaston take the position that 
there is an ultimate dualism in his system. They are not 
entirely agreed as to whether this is a dualism as to the 
criterion of morality or as to the ideal of life. The former 
say that the moral criterion is a dual one, made up of rea- 
son and happiness. The later say that there is a dualism as 
to goodness and happiness as the end of life. Wollaston 
seems to have thought that truth is the way both to a life 
of goodness and to a life of happiness. Happiness enters 
into the motivation but objectively, consequently it is not 
an aspect of the criterion. Perhaps there is more ground 
for the dualistic interpretation "in regard to the goal of 
life," but I think that he had a profound faith in the ulti- 
mate coincidence of truth, goodness and happiness. 

Sidgwick says that Wollaston clearly recognized *'the 
duality of the regulative principles in human nature," a 
thing which the Greek and Roman Stoics did not recognize. 
The Stoic formula of "living according to nature" is also 
his formula, but whereas the Stoics had only one regulative 
principle, that of reason, Wollaston has two, reason and 
happiness." Sidgwick says that "here," in Wollaston's 
book, "for the first time, we find moral good and natural 
good or happiness treated separately as two essentially dis- 
tinct objects of rational pursuit and investigation; the 
harmony of them being regarded as a matter of religious 
faith, not moral knowledge." ^^ His consideration of happi- 
ness as a "justly desirable" end, at which every rational 
being ought to aim, Sidgwick interprets hedonistically, say- 
ing that it "corresponds exactly to Butler's conception of 
self-love as a natural governing impulse. He says, also, that 
"the moral arithmetic" with which he compares pleasures and 
pains is an endeavor "to make the notion of happiness 
quantitatively precise," and anticipates Benthamism.^^ 

«^ Sidgwick, His. of Ethics, p. 197. 
*° Ibid., p. 198. 



Exposition of Wollastori's Section on Happiness 185 

Falckenberg says that: "To the equation of truth and 
morality happiness is added as a third identical member." 
He seems to think that Wollaston makes of happiness an 
entirely distinct principle that acts along with truth and 
morality. He makes neither truth nor happiness the one 
criterion of morality, according to Falckenberg, but they 
are both involved. ^^ I do not think that he understands 
Wollaston, because he certainly speaks of true and false 
pleasures and of morality as true and of immorality as 
false.^^ It is also true that Wollaston says that morality 
and happiness, as well as truth, are conformity to the nature 
of things. True the former are in practical conformity, the 
later in theoretical conformity. A rational being contra- 
dicts itself when it pursues irrational pleasures or does an 
immoral act.^^ 

Hall says that "Wollaston leaves an unresolved antimony 
between the ought and happiness. He says plainly that 'to 
make itself happy is a duty which every being, in propor- 
tion to its capacity, owes to itself, and which every intelli- 
gent being may be supposed to aim at in general,' but as to 
a correspondence between duty and happiness he can only 
say: Now, present pleasure is for the present agreeable, 
but if it be not true and he who enjoys it must pay more 
for it than it is worth, it cannot be good for him. This 
therefore cannot be happiness." And he has a robust faith, 
says Hall, that the practice of truth cannot make any being 
ultimately unhappy, but Hall thinks that Wollaston's own 
doctrine of probalism, "where certainty is not to be had," 
reveals the fact that the correspondence between truth and 
happiness is not so easily proven as his theory demands.^''' 
There is, we must admit an unresolved antimony between 
the ought and happiness so far as this life is concerned; 
but if the universe is rational consistency will demand that 
we believe in the ultimate happiness of the good.^^ 

*• Falckenberg, His. of Modern Phil., p. 189. 

«= Wollaston, ReU. of Nat. Delin., pp. 13 and 38. 

^^Ibid., p. 42. 

" Ibid., Sec. Ill, 16. Hall, Christian Ethics, p. 453. 

««Ibid., pp. 172-3 and 113-14. 



186 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

I think that some of the writers have inferred that Wol- 
laston has a dual criterion because Clarke has. While 
Clarke, with the Stoics, affirms the theoretical self-sufficiency 
of virtue and insists that it is reasonable to choose virtue, 
yet he is equally insistent upon the point that men cannot 
be expected to choose it, if it be not rewarded with happiness. 
Clarke sought to reconcile the apparent contradiction be- 
tween reason and happiness, which are irreconcilable from 
the purely rationalistic point of view of Stoicism, by bring- 
ing in the sanctions of religion, rewards and punishments 
of a future life. There is nothing of the kind in Wollaston. 
He deals with the problem purely rationalistically and says 
of happiness simply that it is reasonable to treat it, like 
every other true thing, as what it is, a desirable human 
state. ^^ Men are virtuous when they act according to the 
nature of things. Happiness, of course, both in this life and 
in the life to come will be the natural result of a life lived 
truly, but such prospects are not treated as the necessary 
incentive to make one do his duty."^^ Clarke just brought in 
happiness as a sanction, whereas Wollaston did not, that 
is the main difference between the two philosophers. In the 
main they agree even as to the subject of happiness. "The 
Deity," says Clarke, "acts according to the eternal rela- 
tions of things, in order to the welfare of the whole uni- 
verse," and subordinate moral agents ought" to be governed 
by the same rules for the good of the public." He thus, very 
rightly, sees the social order as a part of the divine order, 
moral rules as a part of a higher rationality.^^ I would 
agree with Burnett that this is just about the way Wollas- 
ton thought of the general happiness of mankind. He says 
that, according to Wollaston, what makes the desire of 
public happiness a reasonable end is the truth "that it is 
best that all should be happy. That it is best that all 
should be happy is necessarily perceivable by all rational 
natures." "^^ 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Ddin., pp. 38-40. Clarke, Evidences, p. 14. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 37-40. 
" Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, 482. 
" Burnett, Art. in London Journal, p. 214. 



Exposition of Wollaston's Section on Happiness 187 

After, to all appearance, completely understanding the 
moral principle of Wollaston to be an objective one, that of 
conformity of life to the nature of things, Erdmann then 
proceeds to say that he brought in happiness as an addi- 
tional principle. He says that Wollaston made the distinc- 
tion between basing morality upon a subjective basis, of an 
inner imperative or a priori laws of morality, and of basing 
it on an objective foundation. Since there are no common 
principles innate in the mind of man morality must be based 
on the objective foundation of conformity to nature. But, 
says Erdmann, this distinction seems not to have satisfied 
Wollaston and so he introduces into his ethics still another 
idea, the idea of happiness. He, now, tries to prove "that 
seeking happiness coincides with the realization of truth (das 
Suchen Gliicklichkeit mit dem Verwirklichen der Wahrheit 
zusammenfalle)." Both, he says, are so bound up together 
that neither is thinkable without the other, and the one is 
determined by the other. Erdmann interprets Wollaston as 
believing that virtue is its own reward, but that he "is not 
content with this, but points also to the reward which such 
action is to have. This reward consists in happiness, the 
balance of pleasure over pain." He then undertakes to 
explicate Wollaston's treatment of happiness. In order 
to define the idea of happiness he starts, says Erdmann, with 
pleasure and he arrives at the conclusion that happiness is 
nothing but the sum of true pleasures. Happiness, since 
pains must be considered, consists in the excess of pleasure 
over pain, namely, in pure and true pleasure. "This cannot 
exist in something which contradicts one's own nature 
(Dieses kann nicht in Etwas bestehn, was der eignen Natur 
widerspricht) ; Whatever conflicts with one's own nature or 
is destructive of it cannot be pleasant, and just therefore it 
cannot render one happy." ^^ Erdmann thinks that Wollas- 
ton does not really prove the proposition that combines the 
principle of happiness and that of truth. In order to prove 
the coincidence of happiness and truth, Wollaston, he thinks, 
is compelled to resort finally to the idea of God. He tries 
to show that if a creature were unhappy by opposing its own 
"Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, pp. 118-;20. 



188 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

nature and God's plans, it would thereby show itself more 
powerful than God, which would be absurd. That there is a 
gap here, Erdmann thinks, cannot be denied; and it is due, 
he thinks, to the fact that Wollaston "stand here on the 
threshold, so to speak, which leads to a more advanced view 
of ethics which, with an empirical basis, is inevitable, namely, 
pure Eudsemonism. But only on the threshold, and there- 
fore he asserts throughout, that the objective nature of 
things determines actions, at the same time, however, he 
already divines, that the determining factor is onlj^ one's 
own pleasure." ^* 

It is very interesting that Erdmann should differ so ab- 
solutely in his conception of happiness in Wollaston's sys- 
tem, from Hume and from English Hedonists generally. 
While they take the position that Wollaston neglects feel- 
ing as the necessary dynamic to action, Erdmann criticizes 
him on the very ground that his Eudaemonism is mixed with 
Hedonism, that while his ideal and criterion of morality is 
objective he still thinks that the subjective principle of 
pleasure largely determines actions. Erdmann thinks that 
Wollaston found himself in the same difficulty in which 
Mill found himself, years afterwards, I mean in regard to 
the gap between psychological and ethical Hedonism. 
Everyone desires pleasure, this is a psychological fact, but 
what is there that is ethical about it? And how can we 
reason from that evident psychological fact to the moral 
idea that everyone should seek the greatest happiness of 
the greatest number? Mill, as is well known, made the leap 
by a fallacy of Ambiguous Middle, namely, by giving 
"desired" and "desirable" the same connotation.^^ Erd- 
mann represents Wollaston as finding as a connecting link 
("Mittleglied") the fact that pleasure and pain are only 
"what is in accord with one's own nature and purpose (was 
der cignen Natur und Bestimmung entspreche)." "^^ Erd- 
mann says that "this Mittleglied, however, remains an as- 

'* Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, pp. 117-8. Hume, Treatise 
on Human Nature, p. 462. 
^° Mill, Utilitarianism, p. 53. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 39. 



Exposition of WoUastorCs Section on Happiness 189 

surance only." He says that Wollaston thinks that he has 
established the truth of the position and proceeds as if he 
had really proved, what he only postulates, that truth and 
happiness coincide. He goes on in his depiction of Wollas- 
ton: "Only that can give true happiness what is in accord 
with the purpose of the being. If the being is of a double 
nature, animal and human, like man, the principle of truth 
would require that true happiness could be realized only by 
that which is in accord with his noble part (was der Be- 
stimmung seines edlern Theils entspricht). Therefore only 
that makes men happy which corresponds with reason. If 
the irrational gives man pleasure, he thereby contradicts 
himself (Macht dem Menschen das Unverniinftige Verg- 
niigen, so setzt er sich mit selbst in Widerspruch). By the 
enjoyment of the irrational pleasure one declares himself 
to be an irrational being (ein unverniinftiges Wesen), which 
is an untrue proposition." '^^ It may be that Wollaston did 
not take the position that immorality is the affirmation of a 
false proposition, but rather that it is a practical denial 
of a true proposition, a very different thing.^^ 

Erdmann thinks that Wollaston has faith in the rational- 
ity of the universe and that this faith is Natural Religion. 
"Since the realization of truth and the seeking of happiness 
are one and the same thing, all Natural Religion is based 
on the harmony of truth, reason and happiness ; and, as 
real definition, it is declared that it is the seeking of happi- 
ness through the realization of truth and reason (das Suchen 
der Gliickseligkeit durch Verwirklichen der Wahrheit und 
Vernunft)." "^^ From Erdmann's previous discussion, we 
would not have expected him to agree to this hedonistic defi- 
nition of religion. This definition certainly subordinates 
truth to happiness, whereas Erdmann has, so far, inter- 
preted Wollaston as treating them as dual principles of 
morality. The only possible way of reconciling these very 
different interpretations is to say that Erdmann under- 

" Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 117. Wollaston, Reli. 
of Nat. Delin., pp. 39-40. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 9. Ibid., p. 53. 
"Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 119. 



190 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

stands Wollaston, to not only subordinate truth to happi- 
ness, but to make of morality itself only a necessary means 
to happiness and not an end in itself. It is not unfair to 
say that Wollaston considers reason in an instrumental way, 
that is, as instrumental to the realization of life. He does 
not agreed with Kant that the actual literal truth should 
be told in every case in life. While he hesitates to violate 
the least truth, still verbal truth is subordinated to life's 
true meanings. ^^ While Wollaston does treat truth instru- 
mentally, it is not true that he ever subordinates truth to 
happiness in his moral system. If there is any subordination 
it is the other way, and Erdmann's own interpretation, 
taken as a whole, conveys that impression. Happiness is 
good only when founded on truth, on the real nature of 
things. This is undoubtedly Wollaston's position.*^ 

Vorlander takes a position very similar to that of Erd- 
mann, in fact there is some evidence of dependence of the one 
on the other. Vorlander, though, differs from Erdmann in 
that he does not find Wollaston at all self -contradictory in 
his treatment of truth and happiness. He says that Wollas- 
ton was able to show that "the moral aim of truth coincides 
with that of happiness (das mit dem sittlichen Ziel der 
Wahrheit das der Gliickseligkeit zusammenfalle)," because 
a being can be called happy "only when his pleasures are 
true." *^ Vorlander is very true to Wollaston in his inter- 
pretation in that he says that true happiness is to be found, 
not so much in freedom from pain or in excess of pleasure 
over pain, but in conformity to the nature of personality 
and to the nature of things. "The true and highest happi- 
ness of a being cannot be produced by something which con- 
tradicts truth and denies the nature of things (Das wahre 
und hochste Gliick eines Wesens kann nicht durch etwas her- 
vorgebracht werden, was der Wahrheit widerspricht und die 
Natur der Dinge velengnet)." Vorlander interprets Wollas- 

»•' Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 28. 

*^ Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., p. 119. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., pp. 38-9. 

®* Ibid., p. 38. Vorlander, Gesch. der Philosophischen Moral, etc., p. 
385. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 191 

ton to Inean that the true happiness of any man must be 
found in that which "is not incongruous with its nature (das 
nicht unvertraghch ist mit seiner Natur)," but in those 
activities which correspond to the purpose and meaning of 
human life. It is, says Vorlander, absolutely essential to 
morality that a man find his "echte Gliick" in that which is 
consistent with his "nobler part," with his "reason." He 
understands Wollaston to mean that a rational being can- 
not find delight in those pleasures which are irrational with- 
out contradicting its own nature, which practically means 
that a man cannot get real happiness except from that which 
is consistent with reason. "Daher macht den Menschen nur 
das gliicklich, was der Vernunft entspricht." So, he says, 
the way to happiness and the exercise of truth merge, and 
that Natural Religion is based on the unity of them in the 
furtherance of human welfare, "die menschliche Natur zu 
f ordren." ^^ 

In the article on Ethics in the Britannica Williams takes 
the position that "the dualism of governing principles, con- 
science and self-love, in Bishop Butler's system, and perhaps, 
too, his revival of the Platonic conception of human nature 
as an ordered and governed community of impulses, is per- 
haps most nearly anticipated in Wollaston's 'Religion of 
Nature Delineated.' Here for the first time, we find 'moral 
good' and 'natural good' or 'happiness' treated separately 
as two essentially distinct objects of rational pursuit; the 
harmony between them being regarded as a matter of reli- 
gious faith." ^* I think that this criticism can be best an- 
swered by showing the connection of the ethical philosophy 
of Wollaston with the entire stream of moral thought of the 
time, particularly its relations to the systems of Cudworth 
and Shaftesbury. Wollaston took the position that there is 
truth in both of these supposedly conflicting systems, and 
that a true moral philosophy must be a higher synthesis of 
the two. Now, Cudworth had presented the principle of 
social duty as abstract reason, intuition as liable to conflict 

^ Vorlander, Gesch. der Philosophischen Moral, etc., p. 386. 
•* Williams, Art. Ethics in Britan. 



192 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

with the desire of happiness. ^^ Shaftesbury, on the other 
hand, tried to show the naturalness of man's social affec- 
tions and to prove that there is no contradiction between 
his social affections and his self-regarding impulses. ^^ Wol- 
laston looked the situation over and reached the conclusion 
that if reason be thought of as a faculty which is to perceive 
the real natures of things and, in the light of our relations 
to them, determine our duty, then both the emotional im- 
pulses that prompt to social duty and the a priori rational 
principle that demands that men's acts be consistent will be 
realized.^^ 



THE ETHICS OF WOLLASTON RECONCIIiES RATIONALISM AND 

HEDONISM 

In this division of my treatise I wish to defend the thesis 
that the Ethics of WoUaston is really a reconciliation of 
the two equally extreme positions of Rationalism and 
Hedonism. 

Ethical Rationalism takes two forms, an extreme and a 
moderate. According to the extreme form of Rationalism 
the good life is a life of pure reason from which all sensi- 
bility has been eliminated. Moderate Rationalism, on the 
other hand, teaches that, while the good life contains sensi- 
bility as an element, it is fundamentally rational, a life of 
sensibility guided by the reason. The ancient Stoics and the 
modem Kant are good examples of the former and Clarke 
and Wollaston are good examples of the latter. WoUaston's 
rationalism is very far from Intuitionalism for he does not 
believe in innate ideas of morality. He is a Rationalist in 
the sense that the reason is thought by him to be the guide 
in life, but he thinks of reason as dependent upon experience 
for its data. Knowledge is a rational organization of ex- 
perience, according to Wollaston, and morality is determined 

8" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 38-9. Cudworth, Intel. System, 
pp. 730-4. 

" Shaftesbury, Enquiry Concerning Virtue, Part II, Sec. 3. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 19 and 4.5-6. 



Exposition of Wollastoii's Section on Happiness 193 

by the nature of things, the knowledge of which is thus at- 
tained. He treats sensibihty in the same way. It is neces- 
sary to the reaHzation of life and should be treated as what 
it is, a true aspect of human life. The reason, however, 
must be given the entire emphasis in the evaluation of con- 
duct, Wollaston thinks, in that it alone can control the life 
of sensibility. So far from being an ascetic he says that 
the good life is a life of sensibility guided by the reason.^^ 
Sidgwick considers it a characteristic difference between 
ancient Stoicism and modem British Ethics that the former 
considered only the universal reason, whereas the latter con- 
siders both the universal reason and the egoistic reason. 
This is true, in general, but I think that it must be said that 
with Wollaston the principle of happiness is as much uni^ 
versalized and rationalized as is the universal reason. His 
principle is that happiness just like anything else is to be 
treated as what it is.^^ 

The relation of reason to the rest of life is stated by Pro- 
fessor Seth in a way that would, I think, entirely meet the 
approval of Wollaston: "The assertion, which is repeated 
again and again in the rational school, of the dignity and 
independence of man as a rational being, is a sublime and 
momentous truth. For man rises out of nature, and has to 
assert his infinite rational superiority to nature. Goodness 
means the subjugation of nature to spirit. The good life is 
the rational life ; the life of mere nature is, in a rational be- 
ing, irrational. And it may well seem, in the great crises 
of the struggle, as if all else but the rational self were un- 
worthy to live, and must absolutely die. Yet nature also 
has its ethical function; and the moral life is not so stern 
and joyless as Stoic and Kantian moralists would say." ^^ 
Wollaston says that "nothing can be the true happiness of 
a rational being, that is inconsistent with reason. ... If 
anything becomes agreeable to a rational being, which is 
not agreeable to reason, it is plain his reason is lost, his 
nature deprest, and that he now lifts himself among irra- 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 45. 
«» Sidgwick, His. of Ethics, pp. 196-T. 
•» Seth, Ethical Principles, p. 179. 



194 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

tionals., ... a rational being can like nothing of that kind 
without a contradiction to itself." ^^ 

Wright takes a position in regard to the relation of sen- 
sibility and reason that is very similar to the position of 
Seth and well states the attitude of Wollaston on the ques- 
tion. "When the rationalist recommends the life of reason 
as the highest human good he inevitably thinks of this in- 
tellectual activity as superior to feeling and sensation. He 
is bound to insist, therefore, that the demands of feeling 
and sense be strictly subordinated to the requirements of 
reason. An extreme rationalism has sometimes claimed that 
a free exercise of reason, in which consists the highest good, 
would demand the complete suppression of all natural feel- 
ings, impulses and desires. "A moderate rationalism finds 
the good in control rather than in the entire suppression of 
the life of sense and feeling." ^^ Wright grants that intel- 
lectualism has often fallen into several faults, namely, asceti- 
cism and individualism; but he very truly says, that the 
faults of the opposing systems have been far greater. 

The prerogative of a human being is to be able to guide 
his life by the law of universal reason. This is due entirely 
to man's possessing reason, and it is reason alone which dif- 
ferentiates man from the rest of the animal kingdom. A 
purely animal life is determined entirely from without by 
sensory stimuli; and if man were merely animal, his life, 
too, would be guided by instincts and sensibility. Man, of 
course, is both animal and human and this is the explanation 
of the war among his members. To be human and moral is 
to guide the life by reason, instead of allowing it to be 
determined from below by the senses and instincts. But Wol- 
laston's position is superior to that of Stoicism and of 
asceticism generally, in that it does not utterly disregard 
man's lower nature, but rather seeks to realize it as well as 
man's higher nature. All of life, sentient as well as rational, 
must have its true and proper place in the completely reali- 

"^ V/oUaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 39. 

»' Wright, Self-Realization, p. 113. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., 
p. 40. 



Exposition of WollastorCs Section on Happiness 195 

ized life. Because it is reason which differentiates man from 
the rest of the animal kingdom, his life must therefore, to 
be human and to be moral, be guided by reason rather than 
by sense; but it does not follow from this that the entire 
animal nature must be disregarded in the realization of the 
moral life. Much of the life of sensibility, thinks Wollas- 
ton, is entirely rational, in the sense that a rational world 
requires its due and proper expression. When Wollaston 
says that for acts to be moral they must be rational he has 
reference not to their rational form but to their conformity 
to the real natures of things. He says, that not the motive 
alone but all the consequences must be considered in the de- 
teraiination of the character of an act. A rational being 
ought to act rationally, means that he must always act in 
such a way as tends to fulfill his rational nature. Such 
actions are those which are conformable to the nature of 
things, and the choice of actions calculated to result in hu- 
man happiness is, therefore, as rational as any other when 
the happiness is true; but it is contrary both to the laws 
of universal reason and to the nature of things for a ra- 
tional being to enjoy an irrational pleasure. ^^ 

The position has often been taken that there is no middle 
ground between extreme formal and ascetic Rationalism, on 
the one hand, and Hedonism on the other. I think that 
there is such a middle course and that Wollaston has taken 
it. He used the methods of logic and insisted upon the ab- 
solute preeminence of the rational aspect of human nature, 
but he, also, insisted that the whole of man must be taken 
into consideration in treating a man as what he is. Wollas- 
ton says that a man must be thought of not just as a reason- 
ing being, but also as a person with feelings and desires that 
must be considered in the realization of personality. But 
this does not mean that he went over to Hedonism, nor that 
he regarded the reasoning powers of man as but means to 
the securing of happiness. Man's reason is also to be 
treated as what it is, treated as an end as well as a means. 
He took the position that consequences, in so far as they 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 39. 



196 The Ethics of WUliam Wollaston 

can be anticipated, should be considered, and certainly one 
cannot act rationally without the due consideration of all 
possible consequences, sentient and rational. 

Professor Fite says : "The being who acts rationally acts 
consistent with principle, and his rule of conduct is: Let 
your conduct be constantly determined by principle." ^^ 
The question is, did Wollaston think of a rational being as a 
mere reasoning being in the sense of purely formal logic? 
"The Kantian being," says Fite, "is, in fact, the personifi- 
cation of the syllogism. As such he is indifferent to the 
nature of his conclusions, provided only that they are de- 
duced without contradiction from his premises ; he is in- 
different to the ends attained by his conduct, provided only 
that his conduct be self-consistent." Fite says that there 
are no such beings as this, that a being of this kind is a 
psychological impossibility.^^ Wollaston's criterion of mo- 
rality is that of consistency, but this principle is not con- 
cerned with the principle alone but with consequences. The 
"good will," the intention, constitutes an important factor 
but the objective factor is of equal importance.^^ 

Wollaston's Ethics is that of self-realization, understand- 
ing thereby "that the realization of the self is the realiza- 
tion of the purpose implied in the capacities of one's nature. 
, . . Life as a whole will be an attempt to attain a complete, 
perfect and harmonious expression of all his several capaci- 
ties." The one who has this ideal of complete self-realiza- 
tion for all men, as has Wollaston, "is not," as Fite well 
says, "impartial with regard to his premises, nor indifferent 
with regard to the ends to be achieved, but on the contrary, 
distinctly prejudiced in favor of those ends which are im- 
plied in his fundamental tendencies and capacities. These 
constitute the premises of his reason and their consistent 
realization constitutes the rational process." ^^ Moral ac- 

»» Fite, Intro. Study of Ethics, 170. 

" Ibid., p. 906. 

<" Kant, Critique of Practical Reason, Pt. I, Bk. II, Ch. 2. Wollaston, 
Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 19. 

•'Fite, Intro. Study of Ethics, pp. 198-9. Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. 
Delin., pp. 37-9. 



Exposition of Wollaston^s Section on Happiness 19T 

tivity is consistent conformity to rational principles, but 
this is not just logical consistency, that is, consistency 
merely for consistency's sake. This involves the realization 
of concrete life desires and feelings as well as logical con- 
sistency. This simply means that the Ethics of Wollaston 
was objective as well as subjective. He would not admit that 
a life could be denominated moral on the basis of consis- 
tency, which failed to take into consideration human in- 
stincts, desires and feelings and evaluated conduct purely 
subjectively and formally; but he would insist that in the 
good life every kind of consequence that can be anticipated 
enters somewhat into the motivation.^^ 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 37 and 128. 



PRACTICAL RELIGION AND PRACTICAL 
MORALITY 

Under this head I am including Wollaston's teachings of 
a practical nature in sections VI, VII, VIII and IX, which 
includes a very large part of the book, namely, from the 
128th to the 214th page. The teachings of this practical 
part of his book may be stated summarily in these words : 
How to so live this life that one may realize the possibili- 
ties of life ; this can be done only by living happily and well 
and in right relations with the world of things, with all man- 
kind and with God. 

Section VI 
"truths respecting mankind in general, antecedent 

TO ALL HUMAN LAWs" 

Wollaston begins this section of his work with a discus- 
sion of the principle of individuation, which for our pur- 
poses means simply this, since the natures and circumstances 
are different, duty is somewhat different for each man. This 
does not mean that there is no universal principle, but rather 
that one aspect of this universal principle of morality 
is that individuality is a thing that must be always con- 
sidered in determining duty. Wollaston, after establishing 
the supreme worth of the individual, proceeds to universalize 
this principle of individuation and to make the general good 
the test of morality. He says that "whatever is incon- 
sistent with the general peace and welfare or good, is incon- 
sistent with the laws of human nature, wrong and intoler- 
able." He seems to go still further towards Utilitarianism 
when he says that, "those maxims may be esteemed natural 
and true laws of any particular society, which are most 
proper to procure happiness to it. Because happiness is 

198 



Practical Religion and Practical Morality 199 

the end of society and laws ; otherwise we might suppose 
unhappiness to be proposed as the right end of them; that 
is, unhappiness to be desirable, contrary to nature and 
truth." ^ Wollaston is not giving up the idea of conformity 
to nature as the moral criterion, but he is taking pre- 
cisely the same attitude towards happiness that he took in 
the section on happiness, namely, that it should be treated 
as what it is. Now happiness in human society is very de- 
sirable, consequently the principle of conformity to the na- 
ture of things would say that to treat happiness as the 
important thing that it is would be to seek its realization. 
That he is using the same logic and the same criterion in 
this section that he used in the previous sections is evident 
from this statement: "It is contradictory to say that any- 
thing can be a general law of nature," which does not make 
for the general happiness of men, "who partake of the same 
common nature. . . . The transgression of these laws, con- 
ducing to the general good of the world, is wrong and mor- 
ally evil." For if mankind be differentiated from the rest 
of the animal kingdom by reason, then the general welfare 
of mankind "must be the welfare of the rational nature 
and therefore that, and the laws which advance it, must be 
founded in reason." The only rule by which mankind could 
govern itself for the general good of the world, "would be 
one conformable to the nature and circumstances of man- 
kind, that is a principle founded on reason." ^ 

Wollaston anticipates Kant in bringing in the test of uni- 
versality. He asks : "What would be the consequence, if 
all men should transgress this rule?" He answers that the 
result would be, "a general evil, or something disagreeable 
to our nature and the truth of our circumstances, for of 
contrary practices there must be contrary effects." Who- 
soever should violate that rule, "would contribute his share 
towards the introduction of universal disorder and misery," 
and would for his part deny human life to be what it is, 
would deny human society to be what it is, and human hap- 
piness to be what it is.^ Because the world is coherent, act- 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 128. 
'Ibid., p. 129. 



200 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

ing rationally is both the way to rectitude and the way to 
happiness. Acts that are disagreeable to truth are wrong 
and tend to make men unhappy.^ Selby-Bigge says that 
Wollaston constantly confuses the violation of truth, which 
constitutes immorality for him, with another kind of ab- 
surdity, namely, "untruthfulness." Strange to say Selby- 
Bigge takes the position that "untruthfulness" . . . can 
certainly be practiced without absurdity though it cannot 
be imagined a universal practice without some absurdity; 
lying would cease to be profitable to the liar if no one spoke 
the truth or expected others to speak the truth." ^ Selby- 
Bigge fails both in his understanding of Wollaston and of 
Kant. Wollaston does not claim that all absurdity is im- 
moral but only that immorality is essentially absurd, for it 
is as self-contradictory as intellectual self-contradiction.^ 
His understanding of Kant is not correct. He understands 
Kant to teach that things can only be denominated wrong 
from the point of view of the social chaos that would result 
from their universalization. It is true, both for Wollaston 
and for Kant, that it is the exceptional nature of the act 
which makes it morally wrong, but that does not mean that 
it would have to be practiced by everybody before it 
would become absurd behavior and so morally wrong. The 
one immoral act is absurd precisely because it could not 
become universal. One may, with Kant and Wollaston, 
consider that the consequences of the universalization of 
immorality would be the disruption of society, but the par- 
ticular immoral act is absurd and immoral precisely because 
it is exceptional. So our author seeks merely to delineate 
the nature of morality by comparing it to tinith. Morality 
is like truth in that it is conformable to the nature of things, 
but the one consists of thoughts and the other of acts. To 
act immorally is to treat things, as Clarke expresses it, as 
they are not and cannot be.^ Society would go to pieces if 
men generally acted otherwise than in conformity with true 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 143. 
* Selby-Bigge, English Thought in the 18th Cen., p. xxxii. 
^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 15 and 23. 
"Clarke, Nat. Reli. in British Moralists, 489. 



Practical Religion and Practical Morality 201 

relations. Wollaston thinks that an immoral act denies the 
indissoluble unity of life and the world and practically 
affirms the universe to be a chaos, not a cosmos.^ 

Section VII 

"truths respecting particular societies of men and of 

governments" 

Wollaston takes up in this section the treatment of man 
as a social creature. He takes the position that man cannot 
live well except in the society of his fellows. He says that 
it would be quite impossible to live a life of the highest 
order, a life of the reason, a life enriched by the arts and 
sciences, except in society. He says a good many things of 
a utilitarian nature: "The end of society is the common 
welfare and good of the people associated," and all the laws 
and customs of that society must be evaluated from that 
point of view.^ 

Section VIII 

"truths concerning FAMHilES AND RELATIONS" 

The teachings of this section are of very much the same 
nature as those in the previous section. They are even more 
concrete and practical, and consists of practical advice in 
regard to rearing a family. Presumably Wollaston was 
competent to speak on the subject since he was the father 
of eleven children.^ 

Section IX 

"truths respecting a private man, and respecting 
(directly) only himself" 

This is the longest section in the book. Were this all that 
we have from Wollaston we might accuse him of individual- 
ism. The practical teachings of the section are naturally of 

'Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 128 and 143. 
"Ibid., pp. 145-53. 
• Ibid., pp. 154-66. 



203 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

a prudential nature, reminding one somewhat of those manu- 
als of wholesome advice once so common. He says that a 
man ought to consider "all that he is, in possibility, that he 
is an animal, but that he is also a rational creature." He 
will find from experience that his instincts, desires and pas- 
sions are apt to take him in the wrong direction. If he is 
to be true to his real nature he must subject his animal na- 
ture to the law of reason. He will find that acting according 
to reason will coincide with acting according to truth, or 
the true nature of things. ^^ As I have said there is a good 
deal of the prudential in this section. "A man must," says 
Wollaston, "take care not to bring upon himself want, dis- 
ease, trouble; but must provide for his comfortable subsis- 
tence, as far as he can without contradicting any truth, that 
is deny any matter of fact." ^^ A man must not act as if 
he were "a sensitive being only, but also as a sensitive-rational 
being." Physical satisfactions are, however, to be enjoyed, 
and it is irrational to despise such things. "Bodily inclina- 
tions and passions, when they observe their due subordina- 
tion to reason, and only take place, where that leaves it 
open for them, or allows them to be, as it were, assessors to 
it upon the throne, are of admirable use in life, and tend 
many times to noble ends." ^^ 

Wollaston dwells upon the dangers of temptation and 
the weakness of the flesh, and gives some practical advice on 
meeting temptation and the duty of self-denial.^^ "Every 
man is obliged to live virtuously and piously, because to 
practice reason and truth is to live after that manner." 
The man who practices reason behaves himself both rever- 
ently and dutifully.^* To live virtuously is to practice rea- 
son and act conformably to truth, and he who lives so must 
be ultimately happy, so both the commands of reason and 
the desire for happiness will oblige a man to live conformably 
to truth. ^^ "The natural and usual effect of virtue is hap- 

" Wollaston, Relin. of Nat. Delin., pp. 167-9. 

" Ibid., p. 171. 

"Ibid., pp. 172-3. 

" Ibid., pp. 175-7. 

" Ibid., p. 179. 

« Ibid., p. 181. 



Practical Religion and Practical Morality 203 

piness; and if a virtuous man should in some respects be 
unhappy, yet still his virtue will make him less unhappy; 
for at least he enjoys inward tranquillity." ^® Overton says 
that Wollaston argued for immortality on the ground that 
some place is demanded by reason "where the proper amends 
could be made." ^"^ And Wollaston, himself, says, that "He 
who would act according to truth, must not only consider 
what he is, and how circumstanced in this present state, 
and provide accordingly; but, further, must consider him- 
self also as one whose existence proceeds on into another, 
and provide for that too," ^^ 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 182. 

" Overton, His. of the Eng. Church 1714-1800, p. 36. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 218. 



THE METAPHYSICAL TEACHINGS OF 
WOLLASTON 

Only such metaphysical teachings of WoIIaston as are 
indissolubly bound up with his ethics are here considered. 
It is impossible to treat ethical problems without some con- 
sideration being given to more ultimate problems. Selby- 
Bigge characterizes this period of English ethics as unmeta- 
physical.^ This is true in the sense that the Eighteenth 
Century British moralists gave little attention to meta- 
physical discussions, but this was because they took their 
metaphysics for granted. Professor Perry says that it is 
characteristic of the English to treat each case on its own 
merit and apparently without reference to theory.^ This 
does not mean that the Englishman, and this is especially 
true of the Eighteenth Century moralists, has no episte- 
mology nor metaphysics in mind when he philosophizes about 
moral matters. He is not so departmental in his thinking 
as many have thought, nor is he destitute of ideas concerning 
ultimate reality. The Englishman is generally concrete 
in his treatment of ethics, but he has general ideas in mind 
and his general view of the world is always clearly implicated. 
WoIIaston is typical in tliis respect and it can be clearly 
shown that he was aware of the metaphysical implications 
of his ethical philosophy. 

In general, it may be said that the Enlightenment ac- 
cepted the Cartesian dualistic view of the world. Most of 
the philosophers just took that for granted and made it 
the presupposition of all their practical philosophy. WoI- 
Iaston was a true representative of the Enlightenment. Per- 
haps Blakey's statement of his position is a very fair char- 
acterization in most respects. He says that WoIIaston 

» Selby-Bigge, English Thought in the 18th Cen., p. XIX. 
' Perry, Present Conflict of Ideals, ch. XXXII. 

204 



The Metaphysical Teachings of Wollaston 205 

belongs to the class of theoretical moralists rather than 
metaphysicians. But, says Blakey, his ethical speculation 
rested upon a system of metaphysics "that might be classi- 
fied as the epistemology of common sense and as metaphysi- 
cal dualism. Its fundamental principles are that man is 
constituted of two elements, mind and body, the former of 
which is thought of as a real spiritual entity ; that it has in- 
nate powers of reflection, and notions of right and wrong, 
good and evil, irrespective of the influence of the senses, 
or the conventional rules of society. He believes in the 
stability of the laws of nature and that everything in the 
world is regulated by infinite wisdom. His system of ethics 
is grounded on a simple metaphysical principle that truth 
in everything is to be in conformity with the constituted 
order of nature." He says also that Wollaston insists that 
"Every act of a rational being must be the act of one cap- 
able of distinguishing and choosing by the powers of one's 
own will." ^ I agree entirely with this interpretation, with 
the exception of the statement in regard to man's mind pos- 
sessing "notions of right and wrong, good and evil." There 
is a certain idealism in WoUaston's Weltanschauung, of 
that there can be no doubt, but it was of the theistic type 
and therefore thought to be consistent with dualism. 

Morell classifies Wollaston with the idealists and, it must 
be admitted, has very good grounds for so doing because 
Wollaston teaches that truth is the moral criterion and that 
there is an ultimate coincidence between truth, goodness and 
happiness.^ Idealism is involved, Morell thinks, in WoUas- 
ton's thought that there are certain fixed relations in the 
universe, cognizable by the human mind, and that virtue con- 
sists in acting conformably thereto. Ultimate coherency, a 
consistent world order, is the presupposition of a system of 
morality based on truth as a criterion, when truth is con- 
ceived of as Wollaston conceives it, namely, not as an innate 
idea but as ascertained truth involving both experience and 
reason.^ This is true because truth in actuality is the pre- 

" Blakey, His. of Phil., vol. Ill, 1, 3, 7 and 8. 

* Morell, His. of Modern Phil. 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 51 and 45-6. 



206 The Ethics of WUUam Wottaston 

condition of truth being found by empirical and rational 
processes. The fact that Wollaston insists upon both the 
rationality of morality and upon the objectivity of it de- 
mands an ultimate idealism as a metaphysics, because for 
morality to be both reasonable and in conformity to the na- 
ture of things both minds and things must belong to one all- 
comprehending world of meaning, one coherent world order.^ 
It is in the very nature of things, as Clarke says, that is, 
in the very nature of reality and man, that moral distinc- 
tions are founded. The individual soul stands to the rest of 
nature in the relation of subject and object, the perceiving 
mind and the things perceived. The universe is rational, 
there is a certain preestablished harmony between minds and 
things, and the same reason which pervades the whole exists 
also in each individual mind. This is the metaphysical 
presupposition of knowledge in general and of moral knowl- 
edge in particular, when conceived objectively as Wollas- 
ton conceives it.^ 

As we have seen, Wollaston conceives of the world relations 
as grounded in theism. "If there is a supreme being, upon 
whom the existence of the world depends; and nothing can 
be in it but what He either causes, or permits to be ; then to 
own things to be as they are is to own what He causes ; and 
this is to take things as He gives them, to go into His con- 
stitution of the world, and to submit to His will revealed in 
the books of nature. . . . The owning of things, in all our 
conduct, to be as they are is obedience ... to the Author of 
Nature. . . . Things cannot be denied to be what they are 
. . . without contradicting truths eternal.'^ And since God 
has "constituted" things as they are the violation of the 
nature of things "is to act in opposition ... to His nature." ^ 
Wollaston's conception of the universe is involved in his 
conception of the relation of morality and religion. In a 
sense his view of the relation of morality and religion is 
that of Deism, namely, the practical identification of the 
two. It is also true, however, that he begins his work with 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delinw, p. 34. 
''Clarke, Natural Reli., p. 42. 
'Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 8. 



The Metaphi/sical Teachings of Wollaston 207 

a statement of the relation of the two that is so like Kant's 
conception of that relation that some thinkers are inclined 
to believe that Kant derived his conception from Wollaston. 
How like Kant are these opening words of The Religion of 
Nature Delineated: "The foundation of religion lies in that 
difference between the acts of men, which distinguish them 
into good, evil and indifferent. For if there is such a dif- 
ference, there must be religion!" Like Kant, he takes the 
position that morality is imperative and indubitable in its 
demands and that the necessary implications of the moral 
consciousness are equally imperative and indubitable. Kant 
says that the postulates of the moral law are God, freedom 
and immortality. Wollaston says "the foundation of re- 
ligion lies in the difference which men naturally and neces- 
sarily make between good and evil. But while Wollaston, 
like Kant, starts from the practical side, he would not like 
him say that the moral proof is the only proof, that the 
theoretical reason is inadequate. He would not say that 
religion is dubious when theoretically considered and that 
the great tenets of religion can only be established by the 
moral proof. Wollaston thinks that what Kant called the 
pure reason is really the only kind of reason; he believes, 
however, that there are two elements in the reason, the em- 
pirical and the rational. This reason, he thinks, is able to 
tell us both what is true and what we ought to do. Wollas- 
ton seeks to delineate the religion of nature, that is to both 
rationalize and moralize religion. Kant sought to prove 
God, freedom and immortality by the moral proof. Wol- 
laston's position is rather that any kind of proof must be 
capable of intellectualization, for morality itself is based 
on an intellectual foundation or an objective basis, not an 
intuitional basis as Kant thought. Moral and religious 
convictions to be sure, are held by those who have not worked 
out the full metaphysical implications of those convictions, 
which implications constitute an essential part of those con- 
victions.^ 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 6, 48-9, 52 and 61. Kant, Kritik 
d. Prakt. Vernuft, Werke II, 132 ff., 149 ff. Kant, Grundlegung zur 
Metaphysik der Sitten, 2 Abschn., Werke. 



THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF WOLLASTON 

Section III 
"of reasoning, and the ways of discovering truth" 

This section of Wollaston's book is really epistemological 
in nature, as the heading indicates, and it is not especially 
significant for ethics. But it is interesting and significant 
that Wollaston dealt with this question of knowledge be- 
cause of an objection of an epistemological character that 
had been offered against his ethical system. He says that 
"an objection made oblige me in the next place to say some- 
thing concerning the means of knowing, what is true ; whether 
there are any, that are sure, and which one may safely rely 
upon. For if there be not, all that I have written is to no 
purpose." In addition to knowledge of particulars, an intel- 
ligent being must have abstract and universal knowledge; 
"this must be true if there be any such thing as a rational 
being." That this is the pre-condition of rationality, he 
thinks to be an all-sufficient proof. This is the argument 
from efficient cause, namely, that there must be a rational 
world ground or else there could be no rational creatures 
in the world, but there are rational creatures in the world 
so there must be a rational world ground.^ Wollaston says 
that "the knowledge of a particular idea is only the particu- 
lar knowledge of that idea or thing; there it ends. But 
reason is something universal, a kind of general instrument, 
applicable to particular things and cases as they occur." 
We have, he says, ideas of a logical, metaphysical and 
mathematical nature which are not limited to particular 
things, but ideas which "comprehend whole classes and kinds. 
And it is by the help of these that we reason. ... If a 
proposition be true, it is always so in all the instances and 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 41. 

208 



The Epistemologt/ of Wollaston 209 

uses to which it is applicable, for otherwise it must be both 
true and false." ^ 

Wollaston next proceeds to show how absolutely essential 
correct knowledge is to a correct understanding of what 
man's duty is. The relation of ethics and epistemology is 
necessarily very close when ethics is conceived objectively, 
namely, when duty is determined by the real nature and re- 
lations of things. This is true because one can have no 
idea of one's duty without a clear knowledge of things and 
relations. This relation would be quite otherwise in the 
systems of ethics which found the moral criterion not on 
truth but on intuition, moral sense or feeling, because in 
those systems the general problem of knowledge is irrelevant 
since morality is based on a special kind of knowledge. But 
Wollaston clearly realizes that if truth is to be taken to be 
the criterion of morality and if truth is to be conceived as the 
conformity of thoughts to the real nature of things in the 
objective world, then is a clear understanding of the entire 
process of knowing important for ethics. He says that the 
faculty of reason is the moral faculty also, and that the 
knowledge of what is moral is dependent upon what is real. 
"That power which any intelligent being has of surveying 
his own ideas and of comparing them, of forming to him- 
self out of those that are immediate and abstract such gen- 
eral and fundamental truths as he can be sure of, and of 
making such inferences and conclusions as are agreeable to 
them, in order to find out more truth, resolve some question 
or determine what is fit to be done upon occasion, is what I 
mean by the faculty of reason." Most people, he says, both 
think and live in a hand-to-mouth fashion, because "the gen- 
erality of people are so little under the dominion of reason," 
guided only by conventional ideas and their own passions.^ 

In his epistemology Wollaston seeks to effect a reconcilia- 
tion of empiricism and rationalism. I have taken the posi- 
tion throughout this paper that Wollaston is not to be clas- 
sified as an intuitionist in morals nor as an intuitionalist in 
knowledge. The proof of my position is established suffi- 

» Wollaston, Rell. of Nat. Delin., pp. 45-6. 
"Ibid., pp. 45-6. 



210 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

ciently by the one fact that, from first to last, Wollaston 
bases morality upon the nature of things. No one, cer- 
tainly, would take the position that one could have intui- 
tional knowledge of the objective world, so if morality is to 
an extent determined by the nature of things it is to that 
extent dependent upon empirical knowledge for no other 
kind of knowledge can be had of the world of things. Ratio- 
cination is also necessary in most cases to determine one's 
relations and one's duty in view of all the circumstances. 
As I have already said, Wollaston was perhaps more in- 
fluenced by Locke's epistemology than by any other influence, 
and he agreed with Locke that there are no innate ideas of 
any kind. He did not, however, believe the mind to be en- 
tirely passive in knowledge, but rather took the position that 
knowledge is an organization of the experiences presented 
by the senses. "There is such a thing as right reason. 
. . . To prove there is no such thing as right reason by any 
good argument, is indeed impossible; because that would be 
to show there is such a thing, by the manner of proving that 
there is not." Wollaston says that we have immediate and 
abstract ideas and that the relations of these are "ade- 
quately known by the mind," but he also says that "these 
are notified to us by the help of our senses." He says, fur- 
ther, that "more truth particularly of the kind, which is 
most useful to us in our conduct here, is discoverable by this 
method." * I do not understand him to say that there are 
innate ideas of morality or other innate ideas, but only that 
there is a rational factor in knowledge, and as much in moral 
knowledge as in any other. He clearly believes, with Locke, 
that everything in the understanding came in through the 
senses, but he just as surely believes in a rational synthetic 
active mind as a factor in knowledge.^ It is this that enables 
one to orientate himself in any life situation and to decide 
just what ought to be done. So Wollaston teaches that 
there are both sensory and rational factors in knowledge 
and so in morality. It may be asked, if this be true, why 
has Wollaston so frequently been classed with the intu- 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., pp. 48-9. 

"Locke, Essay on the Human Understanding, bk. I, ch. 2. 



The Epistemology of Wollaston 211 

itionists ? I think that a good deal of this misinterpretation 
is due to the fact that this section of his book is not at all 
well known. Many of those who characterize his system as 
Intuitionism show no evidence of having read this section 
giving his theory of knowledge, which is published only iri 
his complete work, a very rare book. Naturally the prob- 
lem of knowledge is treated only incidentally in the other 
sections. 

Wollaston then makes the ethical application of his episte- 
mology: "To act according to right reason, and to act ac- 
cording to truth are in effect the same. . . . To be gov- 
erned by reason is the general law imposed by the Author 
of Nature upon them, whose uppermost faculty is reason; 
as the dictates of it in particular cases are the particular 
laws, to which they are subject." ^ Here, as plainly as any- 
where, Wollaston gives his idea of what conscience is. It 
is a man's judgment as to just what he, in particular, ought 
to do, under the particular circumstances. He makes it 
evident that this is his view as he goes on to say: "It is 
plain, that reason is of a commanding nature; it enjoins 
this, condemns that, only allows some other things, and will 
be paramount if it is at all. Now a being, who has such a 
determining and governing power so placed in his nature, as 
to he essential to him, is a being certainly framed to be 
governed by that power. It seems to me as much designed 
by nature or rather the Author of Nature, that rational 
animals should use their reason, and steer by it; as it is by 
the shipwright, that the pilot should direct the vessel by the 
use of the rudder he has fitted to it. The rudder would not 
be there, if it were not to be used ; nor would reason be im- 
planted in any nature only to be not cultivated and neg- 
lected. And it is certain, it cannot be used, but it must 
command; such is its nature. It is not in one's power de- 
liberately to resolve not to be governed by reason." For, 
he argues, it is contradictory to reason that one will not 
be governed by reason and equally so for a rational being 
not to reason why he acts. The fact that one is to steer 
by the reason by no means implies that experience is unnec- 

• Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 50. 



212 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

essaryj in fact, no figure could better represent the function 
and necessity of the two factors in knowledge and in morals 
than that of the pilot. ^ Wollaston thinks that one can 
steer clear of all dangers by the right use of reason, so he 
says that, "If a rational being, as such, is under obligation 
to obey reason, and this obedience, or practice of reason, 
coincides with the observation of truth," it follows that 
Natural Religion is true.^ 

It is not true, as some critics of Wollaston accuse, that 
he identifies intellectual error and immorality, for he insists 
that immorality as truly as morality implies the truth of 
the relations, and it could not be immorality otherwise.^ It 
is true that he emphasizes proper education and thinks that 
a good deal of the evils of the world could be remedied by 
education. "The generality of people," he says, "are not 
sufficiently prepared by a proper education, to find truth 
by reasoning. And of them who have liberal education, some 
are soon immersed and lost in pleasures, or at least in fash- 
ionable methods of living, rolling from one visit or company 
to another, and flying from nothing so much as from them- 
selves and the quiet retreat proper for meditation; others 
become involved in business and the intricate affairs of 
life." 1^ 

Dugald Stewart says that Wollaston tried to reconcile 
Locke's theory of the origin of our ideas with the immuta- 
bility of moral distinctions by taking the position that vir- 
tue consists in conduct conformable to truth. He says that 
Wollaston insisted that right and wrong cannot be just 
simple ideas, but that morality consists of actions conform- 
able with relations perceived by the reason. ^^ If Stewart is 
right, and I think Ihat he is, Wollaston agreed with Locke 
that there are no innate ideas either of morality or any 
other kind. Right and wrong are not original notions, but 
are products of experience and ratiocination. There are 

' Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Delin., p. 51. 

" Ibid., p. 52. 

• Ibid., p. 8. 

" Ibid., p. 61. 

" D. Stewart, Works, vol. VI, p. 290. 



The Episteifnology of Wollaston 213 

two factors in knowledge, thinks Wollaston, an empirical 
and a rational, and he thinks of them as having just about 
the same relation to each other as Kant afterwards gave 
them. He would not deny that all knowledge comes from 
experience, but he does insist upon the importance of the 
rational factor. In Wollaston's thought it is not just empty 
formal reason that constitutes the criterion of morality, 
and here he differs essentially from Kant who made morality 
to rest on an intuition due to the impingement of an infal- 
lible conscience. Kant made the moral law autonomous, 
resting neither upon experience, nor upon deductions of the 
speculative reason; but upon the revelation of immediate 
consciousness.^^ 

Wollaston would not, however, go quite as far as Locke 
does in the empirical direction. Locke's position is that our 
rules of morality, so far from being innate ideas are just 
the practical regulations that experience has demonstrated 
to be best. Wollaston would not say with Locke that the 
truth and reasonableness of the Golden Rule need to be 
demonstrated but would say that intelligence would assent 
to it as an unquestionable truth.^^ I think that Wundt is 
right in saying that Wollaston's ethics follows logically 
from the epistemology of Locke. "As truth consists in 
the agreement of our ideas with the nature of things, so the 
good consists in the agreement of our acts with things.'^ ^'^ 
To act according to the nature of things is to act morally 
and in obedience to God. So in order to act morally, ac- 
cording to Wundt's interpretation of Wollaston, one must 
first discover the nature of things and his relation thereto, 
then what one's duty i^ begins to become evident. ^^ When 
it is said that Wollaston makes reason the moral faculty, 
it must, then, be remembered that it is the ordinary reason 
that is meant and that the reason determines what is right 

" Kant, Grundlegung zur Meta. der Sitten, Werke, III, 44. 

"Locke, Human Understanding, pp. 26-8. 

" "Wie das wahre in der Uebereinstimmung unserer Vorstellungen mit 
der Natur der Dinge bestehe, so das Gute in der Ueberinstimmung 
unserer Handlungen mit den Dingen." 

" Wundt, Ethik, p. 323. 



214 The Ethics of William WoUaston 

and wrong as it determines true and false, namely, by ascer- 
taining the facts and passing judgment upon the situation.^^ 

Noack says that Wollaston agreed with Locke epistemo- 
logically with regard to the matter of innate ideas. He says 
that Wollaston also "denies with Locke all innate practical 
principles (alle angeboren praktischen Grundsatze), and 
finds the great principle of natural religion in that every 
intelligent, active and free being should act so that he does 
not contradict any truth with his action or that he may 
treat everything as such as it is." ^^ Williams goes so far 
as to say that this view of ethics is a more logical conse- 
quence of Locke's epistemology than is Locke's own ethics. 
This he says is true in spite of the fact that these moralists 
are generally supposed to hold the very different theory of 
Intuitionism.^^ Practically this same position is taken in 
the anonymous article in Francke's Dictionary of Philosophy 
and Science. It is stated "that Wollaston must be ranked 
among those philosophers who base morality on reason and 
not feeling ... or on interest." This distinguishes Wol- 
laston's position both from that of Hedonism and that of 
Intuitionism, with which systems he has often been errone- 
ously connected. The article is very careful to state that 
his position is rationalistic but not intuitionalistic. It says 
that "the majority of the Rationalistic School consider the 
idea of good as a supreme principle, absolutely simple and 
irreducible, divine type placed by God in our intelligence.'^ ^^ 
The article goes on to say that Wollaston takes quite a dif- 
ferent position. He tried to state the criterion of morality 
in intellectual terms : "To act conformably with^ truth is 
to act well {Agir conformemant a la verite, c'est bien 
Agir)."20 

Maurice says that Wollaston wrote his book before 
Locke's Essay had gained any great authority, but that 
"he participated in many of the feelings that gave birth to 
it." He regarded "truth as the foundation" of man's na- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 51. 

" Noack, Phil. Gesch. Lexion, p. 931. 

"Williams, Art. Ethics, Brit. 

" Francke, Diet. Des Sciences Philosophiques, p. 1728. 

« Ibid., p. 1729. 



The Epistemology of Wollaston 215 

ture, Maurice says, and also took the position that "to be 
true is to be happy." Maurice says that Locke had been 
compelled by his epistemology to say that things are good 
or bad "only in reference to pleasure or pain." ^^ Maurice 
says that: "If we must begin from the senses, if all knowl- 
edge of what man thinks and* is must be derived from im- 
pressions on the senses, or from reflections on these impres- 
sions, the sensations of pleasure and pain must be regarded 
as the ultimate ground of good and evil." ^^ It is possible 
to be empirical in method and arrive at an ethical philosophy 
other than Hedonism, thinks Maurice, only by giving due 
consideration to what is implied by "reflections on these im- 
pressions" as a factor in knowledge, but this is precisely what 
is meant by rationalism. Of course you cannot discover the 
true nature of things without actual sense data, but this 
data will be meaningless without organization. An objective 
system of ethics must start with the nature of things and 
this can be discovered only empirically, but moral as well as 
intellectual orientation necessitates a synthesis of experi- 
ence. 

Smale, in his critical treatment of the abstract rational- 
ism of Cudworth, shows the way that Wollaston relates the 
two factors in knowledge. He says that there can be no 
knowledge that is purely sense knowledge because the senses 
give only the individual, the material and the accidental, 
while knowledge is occupied with the universal, the abstract 
and the essential. Sense, as such, "is a mere consciousness 
of the impression, without the slightest reference to truth 
or falsehood ; but it is with truth and falsehood that knowl- 
edge has to do. Sense but gives to the mind the cue for 
action and hints to the understanding." ^^ Sense, Smale 
says, can only give a never-ending flux, each part of which 
is individual and unconnected with any other. Knowledge 
is dependent upon sense, but it is equally dependent upon 
the rational factor. Cudworth is right, thinks Smale, in 
holding that "the reason is the divine governor of man's 

^Maurice, Moral and Metaphysical Phil., vol. II, p. 454. 

"Ibid., p. 446. 

^ Smale, Sense and Reason in Cudworth, With Especial Reference to 
the Ethical Implications, pp. 10-11. 



216 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

life, the very voice of God," if he means by the reason "the 
organized activity of the intelligible ideas." In this sense, 
Smale says, the reason can be regarded as the basis of 
morality; for "as the relations of space and number have 
objective reality cognizable by the reason; so also have 
the distinctions of good and evil." ^* In this sense Wol- 
laston regards the reason as the moral faculty. Cudworth 
had a very different conception of the reason's way of gov- 
erning life. He thought that the guidance of the reason 
is due to certain innate ideas of good and evil which the 
mind has prior to all experience. 

Robert Blakey thinks that Wollaston held a view like 
Cudworth's. He takes a rather interesting position in his 
interpretation of Wollaston, saying that "his ethical specu- 
lations rested upon a system of metaphysical knowledge that 
might be classified as the epistemology of common sense" 
based on a "metaphysical dualism. ^^ I would be disposed 
to agree that this is, so far, a fair characterization of his 
philosophy. He does not stop here, nor does he interpret 
WoUaston's theory of moral knowledge at all realistically as 
he has led one to expect. Instead he says that Wollaston 
taught that the mind is "a real spiritual entity" and that 
"it has innate powers of reflection, and notions of right and 
wrong, good and evil, irrespective of the influence of the 
senses, or the conventional rules of society." While he says 
that "WoUaston's ethics is grounded on a simple metaphysi- 
cal principle that truth in everything is to be in conformity 
with the constituted order of nature . , . and that every- 
thing in the world is regulated by infinite wisdom," he thinks 
that WoUaston's ethics is that of Intuitionism. He inter- 
prets Wollaston this way and then goes right on and says 
that he taught that "every act of a rational being, must be 
the act of one capable of distinguishing and choosing by 
the powers of its own will." ^^ 

Erdmann says that WoUaston's system of ethics rests 
upon an empirical epistemology. He characterizes his 

^ Smale, Sense and Reason in Cudworth, etc., pp. 11-14. 
^^ Blakey, His. of Phil., vol. Ill, 1 and 3. 
2«Ibid., 7-8. 



TTie EyisteTnology of Wollaston 2 IT 

standard of morality as objective, saying that his criterion 
is based neither upon an innate idea of virtue nor upon an 
inner impulse of feeling of oughtness, but upon the real ob- 
jective nature of things. Now this objective nature of things 
can be known only by experience, consequently objective 
ethics must start with experience. I do not understand 
Erdmann to deny that Wollaston believed in a general pre- 
established harmony or general rationality throughout the 
universe, but only to insist that the individual mind is de- 
pendent upon experience for its knowledge of the world 
beyond itself, and that things cannot be treated as they are 
unless we know what they are. It is, we may say, an a 
priori principle, with Wollaston, that things should be 
treated as they are; but what they are is something that 
must be ascertained by experience. "If,'* says Erdmann, 
"the essential of this doctrine is that the nature of things 
determines action and that the same is conditioned by the 
knowledge of the things, the theoretical question how we 
know the things and their relations is of the greatest im- 
portance for ethics from this point of view." For this rea- 
son, he says, Wollaston raises the epistemological ques- 
tion. "Now when he does not answer the question to the 
effect that knowledge comes from experience, but rather 
that it is based on certain abstract ideas whose relations 
are directly certain to us and give the contents to the uni- 
versally true propositions whose application particular 
true propositions are; this seems to speak against the view 
that Wollaston is an empiricist." Nevertheless, says Erd- 
mann, that is his epistemology.^*^ Erdmann thinks that 
Wollaston failed to think himself through, so that there is 
no complete agreement between his attitude toward the theo- 
retical question of knowledge and his attitude toward moral 
knowledge. "In the moral realm he has not arrived at a 
pure empiricism," but he rather "oscillates," thinks Erd- 
mann; "Sometimes he insists on the certainty of reason, on 
ratiocination (der Sicherheit der Vernunft-Erkenntniss), 
and seems to greatly prefer it to sense perception or empiri- 
cal knowledge; because the sense organs are defective he 
*' Erdmann, Geschichte der neuen Phil., vol. II, p. 119. 



218 The Ethics of WUliam WoUaston 

regards knowledge that is dependent upon sense data as 
unreliable; then again he admits that ratiocination has as 
its beginning sense perception (dass die Vernunft-Erkennt- 
niss zu ihrem Anfange allerdinges die simliche Erkenntniss 
habe) ; but finally he speaks again entirely in the sense of 
empiricism when he asserts emphatically, that the mind has 
not so definite a conception of itself as of objects." Erd- 
mann says that Wollaston stands on the threshold which 
leads to a more advanced view of ethics than that of either 
Intuitionism or Hedonism "which, with an empirical basis 
is inevitable (welche bei empirischer Grundlage nicht 
ausbleiben kann), namely, Eudaemonism." Erdmann very 
properly mentions the two sides of WoUaston's epistemology, 
but instead of saying that he oscillates from empiricism to 
rationalism, I think that it would be more correct to say,^ 
that he endeavors to synthesize the two and to show that 
they are both essential to knowledge. In his other work 
Erdmann says that Wollaston makes the essence of knowl- 
edge lie in reason, and at the same time believes that all 
knowledge comes through the senses. ^^ I see no inconsistency 
in such a position, for it is just the belief that there is both 
a rational and an empirical factor in knowledge.^^ 

^Erdmann, Gesch. der neuen Phil., vol. II, pp. 119-120. 
"o Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 45-6. 



THE PROBLEM OF FREEDOM 
Section IV 



"of the obligations of imperfect beings with respect to 
their power of acting" 

In this section Wollaston meets some objections as to 
man's freedom: "The question was this, If a man can find 
out truth, may he not want the power of acting agreeably 
to it ?" He argues at length and in a familiar way that with- 
out freedom there can be no moral obligation; "no being is 
capable of any obligation to do that, which it has not power 
or opportunity to do." Without freedom a person, says 
Wollaston, is in respect to anything "a being utterly unac- 
tive, no agent at all, and therefore as to that act nothing 
at all." ^ Wollaston's position in this section is practically 
the same as in his introduction to the section on the true and 
good, namely, that freedom is the precondition of morality. 
"The imputations of moral good and evil to beings capable 
of understanding and acting must be in proportion to their 
endeavor; or, their obligations reach, as far as their en- 
deavors may." He, in effect, says, that, we cannot say ought 
except where we can say can. "They who are capable of 
discerning truth" and of "acting conformably to it are 
morally obliged to do it, as far as they are able; or, it is 
the duty of such a being sincerely to endeavor to practice 
reason; not to contradict any truth, by word or deed; and 
in short, to treat everything as being what it is." ^ 

Wollaston treats the question rather more in a practical 
than in a theoretical way. He exhorts rational beings to 
live in conformity to reason: "This is the sum of their re- 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Dell., pp. 62 and 7. 
» Ibid., p. 63. 

219 



220 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

ligion, from which no exemption or excuse lies." This does 
not mean, of course, that Wollaston identified religion and 
ordinary morality, for a life in conformity to truth implies 
a life in conformity to all truth, divine as well as human. 
The question of freedom is one which each person can answer 
for himself, Wollaston thinks, by trying to do what he 
thinks he ought to do. "I am persuaded, if men would be 
serious, and put forth themselves, they would find by experi- 
ence, that their wills are not so universally and peremp- 
torily determined by what occurs, nor predestination and fate 
so rigid but that much is left to their own conduct. Up 
and try." ^ Wollaston says that "at least a man can for- 
bear to do that which contradicts truth, even though he 
may not be able always to avoid contradictions of truths 
because of omissions." No man, he says, is morally obliged 
to do the impossible, and "to oblige a man to do what he is 
not free to do is like commanding a man to do something 
with his third hand." * 

Perhaps the main reason why Wollaston said so little 
on the subject of freedom was the fact that Clarke had 
treated the subject so extensively and from the same point 
of view. While Clarke emphasized the moral argument, to 
which Wollaston confined himself almost exclusively, he also 
offered other arguments of a more theoretical nature. He 
says that it is the very nature of man to be free. The soul 
is "a permanent, indivisible, immaterial substance," which 
has certain powers, namely, thinking, feeling and willing. 
Will is the power of the soul to act, and volition is the actual 
exercise of this power.^ "Man either has within himself a 
principle of action, a self-moving faculty, or he has not." 
If he has such a principle he is free, if otherwise, he is not 
free but necessitated by causes without himself. A free 
being is "one that is endued with a power of acting, as well 
as of being acted upon." ^ The soul of man is such a free 
being and so every man "has entirely within himself a free 

' Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 63-4. 
*Ibid., p. 62. 

" Clarke, Letters to Dodel, 176 and 197. 
"Clarke, Remarks, p. 15. 



The Problem of Freedom 221 

principle or power of determining his own action." ^ " 'Tis 
the man that freely determines himself to act." ^ The soul 
has both passive and active powers. In perception, feeling 
and judgment the mind is passive; in volition the mind is 
active. The mind cannot avoid giving its assent to reason- 
able demonstrations. The passive states of the soul are 
necessary, says Clarke, for they belong to the great system 
of natural causes and effects which follow necessarily from 
the nature of things and the laws of the universe.^ It was 
objected, if the soul passive with its reasons, motives and 
judgments be but a part of the necessary order of things, 
does not the soul active belong to the same chain of causes 
and effects? Clarke says not, because no matter what the 
reasons, feelings and motive^, the soul has the power of act- 
ing from within itself. "Nothing that is passive can pos- 
sibly be the cause of anything that is active. Understand- 
ing, or judgment, or assent, or approbation, can no more 
possibly be the efficient cause of action than rest can be 
the cause of motion." The reason or motive, says Clarke, is 
not the cause but only the occasion of action.^^ No matter 
how strong the motive this power still remains. A man can 
act from a strong or from a weak motive, or from no motive 
at all, or he may act even contrary to the very strongest 
of motives.^ ^ There can be no moral agency without free- 
dom, so he agrees w4th WoUaston that freedom is the pre- 
condition of morality. His statement is almost verbally 
the same as Wollaston's ; whatever acts necessarily, does 
not indeed act at all, but is only acted upon." ^^ If there 
be no freedom there is no such thing as morality in human 
lives but only an irresponsible succession of natural phe- 
nomena destitute of all moral quality whatsoever. WoUas- 
ton says, in this connection, that "that which has not the 
opportunity or liberty of choosing for itself, and acting 
accordingly, from an internal principle, acts, if it acts at 

'Clarke, Nat. Reli., p. 121. 

* Clarke, Remarks, p. 11. 

"Leibniz and Clarke Correspondence, p. 289. Letters, p. 405. 

"Clarke, Remarks, pp. 9-11. 

^ Leibniz and Clarke, pp. 121 and 413. 

" Ibid., pp. 413-4. 



222 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

all, under a necessity incumbent ab extra. But that, which 
acts thus, is in reality only an instrument in the hand of 
something which imposes the necessity; and cannot prop- 
erly be said to act, but to be acted on. ... A being under 
the above-mentioned inabilities is, as to the morality of its 
acts, in the state of inert and passive matter, and can be 
but a machine to which no language or philosophy ever as- 
cribed more." ^^ 

Erdmann is one of the few critics of Wollaston who give 
evidence of having carefully considered this section. After 
saying that Wollaston "oscillates" in his epistemology from 
empiricism to rationalism, he proceeds to say that "In his 
view of the practical this oscillation does not show itself, 
action being always determined by the nature of things (im- 
mer ist dass Handeln durch die Beschaifenheit der Dinge 
bestimmit)." He says that Wollaston next grapples with 
the question as to whether a man is free to act according 
to the nature of things after he has attained an /understand- 
ing of them. ^ Erdmann says that Wollaston "recognizes 
that without this ability man can be under no moral obli- 
gation," but he calls attention to the fact that Wollaston 
gave only empirical argument. Erdmann is of the opinion 
that this practical belief in freedom is no proof of its truth. 
"The inclinations determine man and by letting himself be 
determined by them he acts well," this is what Erdmann be- 
lieves to be the conclusion to which WoUaston's idea of treat- 
ing everything as what it is really comes. He says that "such 
autonomy as is due a person when it has to realize an ideal 
set up by himself . . . Wollaston has not granted him." 
Erdmann thinks that "the good act has not been fully de- 
fined" by Wollaston; that "much is still left to the spon- 
taneity of the subject. The decision, namely, to act or not 
to act according to the nature of things, — only that deci- 
sion remains to him, the question of what to do is decided 
by nature." Erdmann seems to think that by bringing in 
the wish for happiness and by identifying truth and happi- 
ness Wollaston really rules out freedom as a factor in the 
moral life, because one's inclination really determines one 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 7. 



The Problem of Freedom 223 

toward a true and a happy life. The only freedom remain- 
ing to man is the freedom to act or not to act according to 
the nature of things. There is no freedom as to the con- 
tent of morality, for that is decided by nature.^* 

Burnet tries to convict Wollaston of determinism for a 
reason very similar to that of Erdmann's. He says that 
Wollaston took the position that the desire of public happi- 
ness is a reasonable ethical end because it is best that all 
should be happy. That it is best that all should be happy 
is necessarily perceivable by all rational natures. But if 
men are so constituted by nature, asks Burnet, would that 
not mean that there is no such thing as morality.^ ^ Burnet's 
criticism fails to consider the great difference between 
things being necessarily perceivable, a merely intellectual 
matter, and morality, which is a practical matter. Wollaston 
does not say that one must act conformably to one's intel- 
lectual judgments. 

Irons endeavors to show Wollaston to be a determinist 
in connection with his exposition of the passage: "Design- 
edly to treat things as being what they are not is the greatest 
possible absurdity. It is to put bitter for sweet, darkness 
for light, crooked for straight, etc. It is to subvert all 
science, to renounce all sense of truth, and flatly to deny 
the existence. For nothing can be true, nothing does exist, 
if things are not what they are." ^^ Irons says that : "In 
these circumstances it is somewhat comforting to learn that 
it is not in one's power deliberately to resolve ^not to be 
governed by reason, for if a person could do this he must 
either have some reason for making that resolution or none. 
If he has none it is a resolution that stands upon no founda- 
tion; and if he has some reason for it he is governed by 
reason. This demonstrates that reason must govern." ^'^ 
Irons draws a conclusion that Wollaston guards against, 
namely, that the will is as equally determined as the intel- 
lect. We give our assent to demonstrated truth, says Wol- 

"Erdmann, Geschichte der neuen Phil., vol. II, pp. 120-22. 

"Gilbert Burnet, Art. in London Journal, p. 214. 

"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 15. 

" Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Review, vol. 12, p. 138. 



224 The Ethics of William WoUaston 

laston, because as rational beings we cannot possibly do 
otherwise. There is no choice in matters of this kind, for 
an intellectual being cannot possibly believe anything which 
he perceives to be self-contradictory.^^ Wollaston does not 
argue from this that moral actions are equally determined, 
but insists that man is free to act or not to act conform- 
ably with truth and the nature of things. Irons, though, 
argues that : "If right action and correct thinking stand on 
the same basis, it is clear that a wrong action is an utter 
impossibility." Yes, of course, but Wollaston is very care- 
ful to state that they do not stand on the same basis. He 
says that morality is as true as an intellectually true propo- 
sition, and that immorality is as false as an intellectually 
false proposition; but he does not place them on the same 
foundation because the one kind of relation belongs to the 
realm of determinism, the other to the realm of freedom.^* 
Clarke has a very clear statement of this difference : "Assent 
to a plain speculative truth is not in a man^s power to with- 
hold; but to act according to the plain right and reason 
of things, this he may, by the natural liberty of his will 
forbear."^^ But Irons, after considering this passage, still 
insists that freedom cannot explain why the impossible is 
actual. His argument is as follows: to do wrong is the 
same as to believe the self-contradictory, which cannot be 
done. Consequently to do wrong is impossible, and not 
even the freedom of the will can explain it. Wollaston, 
in truth, says that to do wrong is to act in a self-contradic- 
tory way; that immorality is as absurd and inconsistent as 
the denial of self-evident truth. Irons proceeds to show that 
morality is impossible from this point of view, because "if 
reason is the motive power which lies behind right conduct, 
the individual who obeys the moral law acts under the com- 
pulsion of his rational nature. There is then no difference 
between moral obligation and rational necessity. An action 
is not moral, however, if it is performed under compulsion 
of any kind. Consequently, if the rationalistic view of con- 

" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 9. 

» Ibid., pp. 7 and 62. 

* Clarke, Nat. Reli., pp. 64-5. 



The Problem of Freedom SS5 

duct be adopted, right action can have no moral value or 
significance." ^^ Wollaston, however, as we have seen, in- 
sists that compulsion belongs only to existential judgments, 
to the reaction of the intellect to matters of fact, not to 
moral actions. Intellectual beings must assent to the truth^ 
of the proposition A is A, but a moral being may act as if, 
A were not A.^^ 

WoUaston's rationalistic theory of morals, Leslie Ste- 
phen thinks to be but an application to ethical specu- 
lation of the Cartesian metaphysics. According to this 
metaphysics, says Stephen, the nature of everything is as 
God has constituted it, consequently there can be nothing 
really independent or external to God. WoUaston^s ethics, 
it is contended, really leads to the , spiritual determinism of 
Spinoza and Calvin. God is the first and the sustaining 
cause of all things. Since "He moves the stars and directs 
the course of a bubble," all natures and relations are de- 
termined ; the moral as the physical laws belong to the nature 
of things as He has constituted them.^^ It might be an- 
swered that if law means the same thing when we speak of 
moral as when we speak of natural laws, there can be no 
such thing as morality because, on that assumption, we 
would be forced to admit that whatever is is right, and 
that morality is mere conformity to nature. Wollaston does 
not identify the natural and the moral, but differentiates the 
one from the other on the ground that intellectual relations 
are determined, while moral relations are free.^^ It is true 
that Wollaston says that morality is like truth in one re- 
spect, namely, that coherency is the norm for both. He 
says that both immorality and self-contradictory intellec- 
tual propositions are absurd, but there is this difference 
between them, the one is possible, the other impossible. ^^ 

While assent is necessitated, it is also true that the doc- 
trine of necessity assails the truthworthiness of knowledge. 
This is true, because in a world where all is necessitated one 

" Irons, Rationalism in Modern Ethics, Phil. Review., vol. 12, p. 142. 

^Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 8. 

^ Leslie Stephen, Eng. Thought in the 18th Cen., vol. 2, pp. 4-5. 

« Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 8, 42 and 63. 

« Ibid., Sec. I, Prop. II and III. 



226 The Ethics of William Wollaston 

event is just as conformable to the nature of things as an- 
other. Only in a system which includes freedom is there any 
tenable ground for the distinction between truth and error. 
This is true because knowledge presupposes a unitary psy- 
chical agent capable of acting and not only of being acted 
upon, for whatever may come from without there is knowl- 
edge only as the mind reacts upon this sense data. The ac- 
tivity of the mind is involved in the relating of the sense 
impressions. There can be no knowledge without this relat- 
ing activity and only a free unitary psychical agent could 
be conscious of identity in the midst of change.^^ 

In his section relating to the Deity, Wollaston under- 
takes the reconciliation of human freedom and divine provi- 
dence. "It is not impossible," he says, "that men, whose 
natures and actions arje foreknown, may be introduced into 
the world in such times, places and other circumstances, as 
their acts an3 behavior may not only coincide with the gen- 
eral plan of things, but also answers many private cases 
too." He thinks that there may well be in the Divine mind 
something like a projection of the future history of man- 
kind and also a Divine guidance of men and at the same 
time men be left to live their lives in freedom.^''^ He insists 
that whatever Divine plans there may be for the world and 
for humanity, and he has a teleological conception of things, 
must be ultimately reconcilable with human freedom. 

A significant thing in WoUaston's ethics is that he clearly 
realizes that morality gets its meaning from the relation of 
each thing to every other in the universe. Morality, for 
him, has its warrant and justification in the ultimate mean- 
ing of reality and every moral act has a significance for 
the whole of reality. If this be his metaphysics of morals 
then we can expect it to become involved in all the difficulties 
connected with every idealistic view of the world, particu- 
larly the difficulties connected with the relation of the one 
and the many. In a theistic view of the world, like that of 
Wollaston, morality must be identified with the realization 

** Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 45.6 and 7. Clarke, Nat. Reli., 
121, and Remarks, p. 15. 
" Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 104 -5. 



The Problem of Freedom 227 

of the supreme spiritual principle. The universe cannot be 
thought of as planless and purposeless but if we say that 
there is an all-comprehending divine plan, a cosmic pur- 
pose running through everything, what is left of the idea 
of freedom and individuality? The individual's moral life 
as a whole is apparently but a part of the supreme purpose 
of the universe, and each moral act but a part of the divine 
plan. To be sure each moral act, on this assumption, has 
a supreme worth; but the question Wollaston is concerned 
with is this : is there any morality attaching to acts when 
the moral life is regarded as but a part of the consum- 
mation of a divine plan. Ethical idealism must identify the 
moral life with the realization of the supreme spiritual prin- 
ciple; but this does not mean, Wollaston seems to think, 
that we are to treat the ^contribution of the moral individual 
towards the fulfillment of the supreme purpose as merely an 
expression, through him, of that principle. Wollaston thinks 
that there is a supreme principle and a general plan of 
things but that men are "left to live their lives in freedom." 
I think that Schiller's words: 

"Nehmt die Gotter auf in euren Willen" 

well expresses Wollaston's position. Wollaston and Clarke 
both reacted rather strongly from the spiritual determinism 
of Calvin and Leibniz and yet they clearly saw that there 
must be a spiritual principle in the universe. 

In every moral act there is a divine and a human aspect. 
The first relates it to the supreme purpose of the universe, 
while the second gives it its individual character. Wollaston 
seeks to find the truth in both, but does not quite effect a 
reconciliation except by faith. If the absolute identifica- 
tion of the finite wills with the infinite is denied, how can 
we believe that the supreme purpose will be realized, since 
its realization is dependent upon the success or failure of 
finite wills.'* We can so far as we are concerned, if freedom 
is true, defeat the divine purpose, for it is contingent upon 
our co-operation. There have been two ways of solving this 
difficulty of the finite and the divine will. Some seem to 
think that the finite moral life is but a medium through which 



228 The Ethics of WUliam Wollaston 

the divine purpose realizes itself. So conceived, the indi- 
vidual is just an instrument, a mere manifestation of the 
absolute, differing from the manifestations in nature only 
in self-onsciousness. Freedom, in this sense, consists in 
doing what the divine requires of us and in acquiescence in 
the divine plan. The supreme principle cannot fail to real- 
ize its purpose in the world no matter what part the finite 
being plays or fails to play. The other extreme view is 
that of the freedom of indifference. Wollaston seems to 
have believed that there is a general plan for the world and 
that our duty consists in conforming our lives to this plan. 
He did not, I think, believe that creatures are necessary 
beings, but only that the way to self-realization is through 
free conformity to the divine plans. ^^ 

The objective method of ethics makes some very clear 
implications as to the relations of the divine and the human 
will, for if our criterion be that everything is to be treated 
according to its nature, then it follows necessarily that 
morality consists in living conformably to God's plans. 
Wollaston says that "the owning of things, in all our con- 
duct, to be as they are, is direct obedience ... to Him, who 
is the Author of Nature:" ^^ Clarke says that the will of 
God always determines itself to act according to the eternal 
reason of things, and that all rational creatures are obliged, 
if they would be rational and moral, to govern themselves in 
all their actions by the same eternal rules of reason that 
govern God. That this is not determinism but moral free- 
dom is very evident from this quotation: "The same reason 
of things, with regard to which the will of God always and 
necessarily does determine itself to act in constant con- 
formity to the eternal rules of justice, equity, goodness and 
truth; ought also constantly to determine the wills of all 
subordinate rational things, to govern all their actions by 
the same rules. It is very unreasonable and blameworthy 
in practice, that any intelligent creature endued with reason 
and will, capable of distinguishing good from evil and of 

* Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. 7 and 164-5. Baillie, in Hastings 
Ency. of Reli. and Ethics, vol. V, p. 410. 
"Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 14. 



The Problem of Freedom 229 

choosing the one and refusing the other, should wilfully and 
perversely choose to act contrary to reason and nature." ^^ 
The moral words "ought," "should" and "choose" all occur 
in this brief passage. And these words are found just as 
frequently in Wollaston's work. "By religion," he says, 
"I mean nothing else but an obligation to do what ought not 
to be omitted, and to forbear what ought not to be done." 
This means, according to WoUaston, "That every intelli- 
gent, active and free being should so behave himself, as by 
no act to contradict truth; or, that he should treat every- 
thing as being what it is." ^^ 

" Clarke, Nat. Reli., pp. 186-7. 

" Wollaaton, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 24. 



THE PROBLEMS OF EVIL AND IMMORTALITY 

Section V 



"truths relating to the deity" 

This is a long, interesting section but only a small part 
of it is of any particular interest to us. His discussion of 
the problems of evil and immortality is all that bears on 
our question. He takes up the problem of evil by saying 
that the conception of the Deity as unitary precludes the 
existence of an independent principle of evil. As to moral 
good and evil, "they seem," he says, "to depend upon our- 
selves. If we do but endeavor, the most we can, to do what 
we ought, we shall not be guilty of not doing it ; and there- 
fore it is not our fault, and not to be charged upon any 
other being, if guilt and evil be introduced by our neglect, 
or abuse of our liberty." ^ His solution of the problem of 
moral evil is rather more practical than theoretical. As to 
physical evil he suggests as an explanation our finitude or 
narrow point of view. "Some things seem to be evil, which 
would not appear to be such, if we could see through the 
whole contexture of things." And if there is a future state, 
that which seems to be evil now may be rectified or rather 
shown to be good from the point of view of eternity. To 
ask why God permits evil, he says, is the same as asking 
why God created a material world inhabited by imperfect 
beings.^ "If the virtuous man has undergone more in this 
life, than it would be reasonable he should suffer, if there 
was no other; yet those sufferings may not be unreasonable, 
if there is another. For they may be made up to him by 
such enjoyments, as it would be reasonable for him to 

^ Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 72. 
=• Ibid., pp. 72-6. 

230 



The Problems of Evil and Immortality 231 

prefer, even with those present mortifications, before the 
pleasures of this life with the loss of them. Sometimes the 
only way to the felicities of a better state may lie through 
dark and difficult passes, discipline to some men being neces- 
sary, to bring them to reflect, and to force them into such 
methods as may produce 'in them proper improvements; 
such, as otherwise and of themselves they would never have 
fallen into. On the other side, if vicious and wicked men 
do prosper and make a figure, — yet it is possible their suf- 
ferings hereafter may be such, as that the excess of them 
above their past enjoyments may be equal to the just pay- 
ment of their villainies and wickedness." ^ This Wollaston 
thinks argues for the necessity of the future state, "if good 
and bad men are not respectively treated according to rea- 
son in this life, they may be yet so treated, if this and an- 
other to follow be taken together into account.* 

The assumption back of all the thinking of Wollaston 
is that the universe in which we live is inherently rational 
and coherent. He thinks that this is the necessary implica- 
tion of all thinking. An objective system of ethics is of 
course built upon this assumption. "The foundation of re- 
ligion lies in that difference between the acts of men, which 
distinguishes them into good, evil, indifferent." ^ These dis- 
tinctions lie in the nature of things and so morality con- 
sists in the "owning of things, in all our conduct, to be as 
they are." ^ Wollaston believes in immortality on the ground 
that "there must be a future life where proper amends may 
be made," where the wrongs of this world may be made right. 
This belief in immortality, thinking could demand only if 
the world is thought to be ultimately consistent and ra- 
tional. If this life be all, Wollaston says, "the general and 
usual state of mankind is scarce consistent with the idea 
of a reasonable cause." ^ He thinks that one could not 
believe in a Supreme Being, at least in one who is rational, 
without believing in the hereafter, because it would be inher- 

» Wollaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., p. 113. 
* Ibid., p. 114. 
"Ibid., p. 7. 
" Ibid., p. 14. 
' Ibid., p. 205. 



2S2 The Ethics of WUUam Wollastcm 

ently irrational for the good to suffer as they frequently 
do in this life if there were no after life of blessedness. But 
how can we be sure that God will reward virtue in the next 
world more liberally than in this? In trying to answer this 
question, he says, he "begins to be very sensible how much 
he wants a guide.'* He is not able to fall back on revela- 
tion for "a guide" but still he feels sure that all is well. His 
ground for this faith is that there must be "a reasonable 
cause" to explain it all.^ 

• WoUaston, Reli. of Nat. Deli., pp. ll»-4 and 211. 



INDEX 



Albee, quoted, 175. 

Aliotta, quoted, 110. 

Analogy, method of, in Ethics, 
35-5i; 78-84, 56, 98, 106, 109, 
126, 138, 144, 148, 152, 200, 224. 

Aristotle, quoted, 110. 

Baillie, referred to, 228. 

Balguy, quoted, 100. 

Bentham, quoted, 173; referred to, 
184. 

Blakey, quoted, 33, 83, 145, 153, 
204, 216. 

Bott, quoted, 62, 73, 96, 180. 

Bradley, referred to, 176. 

Brown, quoted, 118, 144, 174. 

Butler, Bishop, quoted, 167; re- 
ferred to, 184, 191. 

Calvin, referred to, 25, 225, 227. 

Carneri, quoted, 169. 

Catherein, quoted, 94. 

Clarke, John, 41, 50, 72, 95, 116, 

119, 137, 157, 182. 
Clarke, Samuel, influence on Wol- 

laston, 25-31, 72, 105, 219; 

quoted, 55, 79, 200, 920, 228; 

referred to, 84, 87, 105, 108, 133, 

139, 159, 176, 186, 206. 
"Conformity to Nature," as moral 

formula, 14, 25, 90, 135, 184, 198. 
Conscience, See Intuitionism ; Wol- 

laston's notion of, 57, 59, 132, 

145, 211. 
Consequences, place of in motiva- 
tion, 29, 49, 129, 151, 169, 172, 

177, 179, 183, 195, 197, 200. 
Consistency, as the moral criterion, 

33-115, 122, 138, 141, 147, 156, 

164, 180, 189, 191, 193, 196, 205, 

220. 
Conybeare, referred to, 4, 108. 
Cudworth, influence on WoUaston, 

19, 191, 215. 



Cumberland, influence on WoUas- 
ton, 22. 

Deism, relation of WoUastoB to, 

13, 31. 
Descartes, referred to, 19, 142, 205, 

225. 
Dewey, quoted, 16. 
Drechsler, referred to, 4. 

Empiricism, 16, 21, 24, 93, 139, 151, 
209, 216, 222. 

Enlightenment, relation of Wol- 
laston to, 13. 

Epicureanism, 167, 172. 

Epistemology, 208-218, 16, 19, 69, 
133, 139, 192, 206. 

Erdmann, quoted, 24, 26, 32, 59, 
87, 90, 108, 187, 190, 216, 222. 

Eudaemonism 22, 29, 129, 188, 218. 

Evil, problem of, 230-32, 31, 33, 46. 

Existential judgments. See Truth; 
relation of to Valuational judg- 
ments, 35-59, 71, 78, 85, 89, 105, 
113, 120, 140, 161, 225. 

Experience, 20, 34, 59, 69, 125, 133, 
138, 140, 192, 208, 211, 216. 

Falckenberg, quoted, 27, 88, 131, 
185. 

Feeling, as a moral criterion, 14, 
24, 128, 135, 137, 152, 159, 179; 
place of in motivation, 57, 73, 
151, 154, 156, 169, 179, 188, 194, 
197. 

Fite, quoted, 196. 

"Fitness of Things," as moral cri- 
terion, 26, 29, 45, 57, 71, 80, 106, 
110, 135, 138, 149, 169. 

Freedom, necessity of, for morals, 
32-5, 219-229, 17, 26, 29, 39, 45, 
47, 53, 55, 61, 80, 83, 86, 88, 97, 
102, 107, 110, 113, 118, 124, 126, 
142, 151, 154, 158, 205, 214. 



233 



234 



Index 



Garve, quoted, 4, 39, 87, 108, 130, 
143. 

Gass, quoted, 93, 170. 

Gay, quoted, 149. 

God, His laws natural and the cri- 
terion of morals, 32-76, 14, 21, 
23, 28, 31, 132, 142, 149, 164, 186, 
206, 211, 216, 228, 231. 

Goodness, nature of, 35-92, 23, 98, 
104, 108, 118, 124, 142; relation 
to truth, 33-115, 118, 136, 146, 
164, 172, 177, 187, 200, 209. 

Gross, quoted, 38. 

Grote, quoted, 84. 

Grotius, influence on Wollaston. 
18. 

Hall, quoted, 98, 185. 

Happiness, significance of, for 
morals, 162-199, 17, 23, 28, 58, 
62, 128, 138, 144, 145, 151; rela- 
tion of, to truth, 184-197. 

Hedonism, 162-197, 16, 18, 22, 27, 
62, 85, 128, 132, 138, 144, 150, 215. 

Hobbes, influence on Wollaston, 18, 
25, 79. 

Humanity. See Personality. 

Hume, quoted, 124, 130, 139, 151; 
referred to, 134, 178. 

Hursts, quoted, 163, 172. 

Hutcheson, quoted, 117, 154. 

Idealism, metaphysical, relation of 
Wollaston's ethics to, 204-7, 16, 
66, 83, 85, 91, 102, 108, 117, 123, 
132, 136, 140, 145, 161, 165, 173, 
185, 226. 

Identity, logical law of, as the 
moral law, 17, 21, 24, 29, 31, 45, 
^^, 71, 79, 82, 85, 89, 95, 99, 103, 
107, 110, 119, 126, 131, 169, 177, 
225. 

Immortality, 230-2, 31, 170, 185, 
207. 

Innate ideas, of morality, 21, 23, 
90, 94, 135, 145, 187, 210, 216. 

Intellectual and moral, diff'erentia 
of, 37, 42, 46, 49, 63, 71. 

Intellectualism, 14, 19, 24, 35, 70, 
84, 126, 134, 138, 162, 168, 173, 
178, 194. 

Intelligence, necessity of, for 
moral responsibility, 33, 37, 39, 



47, 61, 83, 154, 158, 205, 214, 

216, 229. 
Intention, 45, 47, 49, 96, 119, 129, 

157. 
Intuitionalism, 15, 19, 70, 133, 210, 

216. 
Intuitionism, 15, 19, 24, 29, 34, 66, 

69, 81, 86, 90, 92, 110, 125, 130, 

132, 137, 144, 155, 168, 192, 210, 

216, 218. 
Irons, quoted, 112, 123, 158, 223. 

Janet, quoted, 102, 116, 141. 

Jodl, quoted, 134. 

Jouffroy, quoted, 101, 120, 127. 

Kames, quoted, 134. 
Kant, referred to, 4, 15, 34, 66, 
114, 142, 190, 196, 199, 207. 

La Rossignol, quoted, 105, 173. 
Leibniz, referred to, 221, 227. 
Locke, influence on Wollaston, 16, 

21, 210; quoted, 24, 90, 212. 
Logic, relation of, to Ethics, 95- 

114, 21, 30, 51, bQ, 81, 85, 125, 

131. 
Lowman, quoted, 27. 

Mackintosh, quoted, 81, 118. 

Martineau, quoted, 110, 116, 139. 

Maurice, quoted, 214. 

Metaphysics, Wollaston's view of, 
204-07, 226-32; relation to 
Ethics, 17, 83, 91, 102, 108, 117, 
123, 136, 139, 140, 161, 165, 185, 
204, 209. 

Moral Sense, 69, 117, 125, 135, 145, 
152, 155, 158. 

Morell, referred to, 205. 

Nature of Things, as the moral 
criterion, 33-115, 14, 17, 22, 29, 
127, 131, 135, 140, 146, 159, 167, 
170, 177, 180, 186, 195, 202, 206, 
209, 217. 

Newton, influence on Wollaston, 
19; referred to, 4, 90, 108. 

Noack, quoted, 170, 214. 

Norden, quoted, 134. 

Objective method in Ethics, 85-94, 
21, '2Q, 33, 47, 71, 129, 131, 135, 
162, 168, 187, 193, 215, 231. 



Index 



S35 



Obiectivity, of the good, 34-115 
20, 24, 27, 125, 129, 139, 147, 159, 
163, 169, 172, 178, 188, 206, 209, 
216. 

Ought, and is, 130-146, 26, 36, 51, 
56, 63, 85, 108, 120, 127, 152, 160, 
224. 

Overton, quoted, 203. 

Perry, referred to, 204. 

Personality, significance of, for 
morals, 45, 47, 64, 73, 75, 77, 82, 
87, 97, 115, 119, 121, 129, 139, 
142, 148, 152, 163, 167, 174, 177, 
180, 190, 195, 197. 

Plato, moral system of, 71, 84, 
191. 

Price, referred to, 81, 99, 146. 

Rashdall, quoted, 159. 

Rationalism, 184-197, 16, 19, 22, 
30, 70, 87, 93, 112, 117, 133, 140, 
158, 162, 169, 186, 192, 206, 209, 

222. 

Reason, as moral faculty, 184-97, 
75, 154, 209, 219; competence of, 
in the realm of Ethics, 33-115, 
13, 20, 25, 30, 122, 131, 139, 148, 
152, 166, 211, 223; impotence of, 
151, 154, 158. 

Religion, Natural, 32-76, 129-142, 
20; 29, 80, 87, 90, 102, 108, 117, 
161, 171, 180, 189, 206, 212, 219, 
228. ^. - 

Revelational Theology, ethics ot, 
13, 17, 24, 29, 132, 149. 

Right and wrong, differentia of, 
32, 37, 6Q, 68, 71, 127. 

Rogers, referred to, 19, 138. 

Schmidt, quoted, 92. 
Selby-Bigge, quoted, 13, 31, 79, 115, 
138, 177, 200, 204. 



Sensational School of Morals, 14, 

24, 135. 
Seth, referred to, 86, 193. 
Shaftesbury, referred to, 191. 
Sidgwick, quoted, 79, 176, 178, 184. 
Simmel, referred to, 114, 159. 
Smale, quoted, 215. 
Spinoza, referred to, 225. 
Stephen, L., quoted, 3, 14, 19, 55, 

108, 110, 132, 155, 177, 225. 
Stewart, quoted, 90, 212. 

Truth, nature of, 208-19, 33-35, 
26, 43, 52, 53, 71, 80, 85, 82, 98, 
119, 142, 168; criterion of mor- 
als, 33-115, 130-46, 28, 124, 178, 
181, 202, 209; relation to happi- 
ness, 184-197, 28, 65, 149, 162, 
164, 171, 177, 180, 202, 215. 

Truthfulness, necessity of, 51, 75, 
183, 190; necessary exceptions, 
75, 168, 190. 

Ueberweg, quoted, 36. 
Utilitarianism, 176-83, 28, 198. 

Value, ludgments of, 26, 36, 53, 
58, 85, 108, 120, 127, 139, 160. 

Von Gizycki, quoted, 134. 

Von Hartmann, quoted, 87, 91, 
116, 130. 

Vorlander, quoted, 28, 87, 98, 190. 

Warburton, referred to, 182. 
Warlaw, referred to, 31, 118. 
Welfare, 22, 29, 65, 129, 176, 180, 

186, 191, 198, 201. 
Will, significance of, for morality. 

See Freedom. 
Williams, quoted, 81, 214. 
Windelband, quoted, 83, 108, 169. 
Wright, quoted, 194. 
Wundt, quoted, 25, 90, 99, 126, 212. 



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